


Hungry Ghosts

by flyingisland



Series: Aomori Adventures [2]
Category: Durarara!!
Genre: F/M, M/M, Sexual Harassment
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-08
Updated: 2016-07-27
Packaged: 2018-07-13 22:27:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 40,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7140158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingisland/pseuds/flyingisland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Sequel to Smoke and Mirrors)</p><p>There's a wedding in Aomori, there's Izaya keeping secrets and growing only more distant as the days pass, and there's Shizuo, just trying to hold everything together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Emergence

The sun rises over Tokyo.

Shizuo awakens to the smell of coffee, furrowing his brow and scrunching his nose. It stinks. He never makes coffee in the morning. It’s too bitter, too hot when the summer heat still has yet to fade away in early autumn, and as he rolls over and cracks open tired eyes, he realizes—

This isn’t his apartment.

Oh, yeah.

He’s been sleeping with Izaya for a while now. It’s been almost six months.

Shirtless and sweaty, he draws fingers over the long-healed scars across his chest. He stops to contemplate the shrapnel still surely lodged in his ribcage, so close to his heart if only his bones weren’t so ridiculously strong. He thinks back to the terrified faces of old friends, to Izaya trembling before him, eyes begging for his heart to keep beating regardless of so much blood—

He shakes his head, chasing those thoughts away.

He hasn’t thought about that night in a long time.

Pulling himself out of bed, he attempts to smooth out sleep-rustled hair. There are faint pink lines adorning his chest, his back and neck. He catches a glimpse of them in the mirror as he passes and clicks his tongue. He’s going to need to tell Izaya to trim his nails again. His shirt collar isn’t going to hide all of this.

When he makes it into the kitchen, Izaya is standing at the counter, wearing only an oversized button-up, hip cocked, flipping through his mail and waiting for the coffeepot to fill.

Shizuo comes to him, a magnetic force drawing him closer. He wraps his arms around Izaya’s waist, pressing his face in the crook of Izaya’s neck. He smells like he always does—like shampoo and hints of expensive cologne. Like every place that he’s been hiding on the job, like cigar smoke and fresh air.

Izaya reaches a hand back and runs it through his hair. He pushes one of the letters into Shizuo’s face.

“We’re invited,” he greets, voice rough with exhaustion, raw from activities that Shizuo forces himself not to think about.

Shizuo pulls back, takes the letter from his hands. He flips open the envelope, thick and expensive, adorned with a pattern so fancy that he wonders if they’re being invited to a billionaire’s home.

_You are cordially invited_

_To the marriage of Ueda Kazuma and Hashimoto Chiyo._

_05/03/17._

_2:00pm._

_Save the date!_

Written at the bottom of the letter, in a scrawl so loopy and upbeat that it can’t be anyone’s but Chiyo’s, are the words:

_“You’d better be there, or I’m coming all the way to Ikebukuro in my wedding dress to get you! I can be a real bridezilla! Don’t test me!”_

Shizuo rolls his eyes. The wedding is an entire five months away. He wonders if Tom-san will give him a few days off of work, if Izaya is interested in going at all. He knows better than to doubt her words. He knows her, he remembers that obnoxious laugh, that endless determination, the tightness of her final hug that had stung against his healing wounds as he and Izaya had made their way toward their flight home.

“We’re going, of course,” Izaya states simply.

He sighs. Izaya pulls the coffee pot from the warmer, pouring himself a cup and drinking it black.

A wedding… he’s never been to one before.

Chiyo doesn’t understand what a disaster this could turn out to be.  


* * *

 

  
“So you’re really going to travel all the back to Aomori for a wedding?” Tom-san questions, eyebrow cocked in disbelief as he takes a long drag off of his cigarette, “You were really popular over there, weren’t you?”

Shizuo scuffs his feet against the ground, watching Vorona idly as she flips through the invitation. She’s giving painstaking attention to each word, despite how few are written there. On the back, there’s an address to the banquet hall, and she scratches a finger against the indented letters before looking up.

“What is Bridezilla?” she asks, deadpan, “Is this the sort of person who travels on plane in their wedding dress?”

Shizuo bites back a laugh, drags a hand through his hair. Tom-san looks to her with a smile.

“Weddings can get stressful,” he explains, “Sometimes the brides go a little crazy.”

She nods as though she understands, and maybe she does. Shizuo doesn’t bother wondering about it, worrying if Vorona understands Chiyo’s silly threats or just how much he truly believes that she might actually end up in Ikebukuro instead of walking down the aisle if he and Izaya don’t show up.

“Well,” Tom sighs, plucking the invitation from Vorona’s hands and looking it over, “It’s still a long time away. I’m sure Vorona and I can handle things for a week or so, right Vorona?”

She nods, even more serious than before.

“Affirmative,” she says, cold gaze locked onto Shizuo, so intense that he can’t help but look away, “We will hold down fort until Senpai returns from visiting this Bridezilla.”

She’s so determined suddenly, so geared up to fight despite the date looming so far away in the future. Tom-san lets out a chuckle, hands him back the invitation. They’re finishing up a smoke break before their next job, three more hours until the end of their shift.

And despite himself, despite how much he might be worried about ruining Chiyo’s wedding, about facing those old friends again, there’s a certain bounce in his step that he can’t quite deny.

Tom-san doesn’t mention it, Vorona doesn’t seem to notice it at all.

He sends Izaya a text, telling him only, _‘Tom-san gave me time off for the wedding.’_

His phone buzzes seconds later.

 _‘Stop by my place tonight. I’m ordering dinner.’_  
  


* * *

 

  
Smoke fills the room—familiar, overwhelming, foggy in the dim light filtering through closed windows in a basement office, surrounded by so many Yakuza that a regular man might be begging for his life.

Izaya, however, forces a smile. His eyes struggle to stay open, stinging through the smoke. He’s leaning back on a broad couch, flicking his gaze from scarred, scary face to face, eyes landing finally on Shiki, who sits stiffly across from him.

It’s hot. Sweat dots the foreheads of every man in the room.

Shiki clears his throat and leans forward, placing a bundle of papers on the table between them.

“As you know,” he begins finally, after Izaya decides that his little intimidation game has finally grown tired, “We were very pleased with your work earlier this year.”

Izaya cocks his head to the side, a feral smirk drawing out along his lips. Of course they were, he thinks. He got the job done. He sent a bad man to prison for many, many years. He dealt with a depraved pervert for so much longer than he should have had to. He saved the day, regardless of everything working against him.

Orihara Izaya always comes out on top. They should know this by now.

“Despite nearly blowing your cover a dozen times, somehow, you managed to recover the money and put Fukayama away. Embezzlement, fraud, assault, and truly, the attempted murder charge was a nice touch.”

Shiki raises a steely gaze to Izaya’s face, seeming quite unhappy that his usual scare tactics aren’t working, even knowing exactly who he is dealing with and how superior Izaya can prove to be at a game of wills such as this.

“That being said, we have another job for you, seeing as you’ll be returning to Aomori in the spring.”

Izaya twitches, fixes his mask of a smile and looks at Shiki for what feels like an eternity. He has no idea how Shiki could have found out about that. Unless…

“Yes, Koizumi-san will be attending as well. He’s requested your services again for a few smaller jobs. You see, I told him to contact you himself, but it seems that something is stopping him…”

His pause draws out between them, awkward and long, a weight pressing down against his lungs as he watches Shiki’s eyes glint slyly. Control exchanges hands, Shiki pushes his queen into place, winning this round, maybe, and maybe so many more that they haven’t even started yet.

“You see, Orihara,” he says slowly, a glimmer of something evil simmering in his gaze, teeth bared and ready to sink into his next words, “There’s a downside to mixing pleasure with work. The bad guys have a much easier time prodding at your weaknesses.”

And he’s right, of course. He hadn’t intended to reconcile with Shizu-chan during the job. He hadn’t even known that the brute was coming along. He was ill-prepared, naive, thinking only that he could be strong enough to deny his feelings and not “think with his dick” as Shiki had so tactlessly suggested so many months ago, and now…

Shizu-chan might get mixed up in this underground business. If he steps on the wrong feet, he is more than capable of dodging the resounding punches, but Shizu-chan?

He’s strong, of course, but a bullet is a bullet, he muses.

And if Fukayama’s banquet had taught him anything, not even monsters are immune to the icy grip of death.

He swallows the growing lump in his throat, throws together a front so shaky that even a single prod might send him barreling out of the room.

He smiles, as convincingly as he can—cold and knowing, a man holding a handful of cards with a bluff so convincing that no one will know that they’re all threes.

“Koizumi-san can contact me whenever he likes,” he replies simply, picking dirt from his nails, feigning as much casualness as he can muster, “He knows my number—all of them, of course.”

He spares a pointed look in Shiki’s direction.

“He has nothing to be afraid of, as long as he behaves.”

And Shiki laughs, asks him when he decided to let a monster fight his battles for him. He slides the papers further across the table. He sends Izaya one final warning look.

“For your services,” he says, “We can look the other way when it comes to… whatever the Hell you’re doing with Heiwajima. But don’t let Koizumi-san fool you.”

Izaya is rising to leave, tucking the papers away under his arm. He’s sparing a stiff bow, making his way to the door.

And Shiki calls after him.

“He’s not as powerless as you think, Orihara. Even your boyfriend has weaknesses.”

The heaviness in Izaya’s belly feels like a thousand tiny stones. He breathes in, breathes out, checks his phone for the time as his lungs revel in the fresh air of the outside.

Shizuo has sent him a single text.

He feels like he might be sick. He can barely focus on the words dotting the screen.

He won’t be able to eat tonight, he thinks, but Shizu-chan has the appetite of a horse.

_‘Stop by my place tonight. I’m ordering dinner.’_

Let me keep an eye on you.

Let me make sure that you’re still safe.  


* * *

 

  
Shizuo gets off of work a little late. He says goodbye to Tom-san and Vorona, stops by a convenience store and picks up some milk. Izaya doesn’t keep it stocked in his apartment. He turns his nose up at it every time that Shizuo brings it over, despite drinking that heinous hot sludge multiple times a day, and the mornings just don’t feel right without a nice bottle of milk to start them off.

He makes his way toward the bus stop, leans back against the sign. He’s smoking, watching the cars pass. He pulls out his phone to check his texts and kill some time.

_Flea Bastard (07:45:23): The takeout is getting cold, Shizu-chan! Don’t tell me that you’re standing me up after all this time? How cruel._

_Flea Bastard (08:05:12): Shizu-chan, leaving a lady waiting is rude._

_Flea Bastard (08:30:30): Shizu-chan, if you’re not coming, you could at least let me know. The food is cold. Did you miss the bus again?_

_Flea Bastard (09:02:23): Shizu-chan. Did you break your phone?_

He tilts his head back, letting out a long breath and watching as the smoke fills the air. Izaya has been strange lately, always keeping such close tabs on him, never allowing him to stay at his apartment for too long. He’d suggested the idea of moving in together only once, weeks ago, and Izaya had looked at him as though he’d grown a second head, as though maybe he’d suggested that they invite Simon into their relationship or even as though he was trying to break up.

The look on his face for a split second had been startling, and while Shizuo had known better than to pry, he’d pushed the issue.

 _“It’s a pain in the ass going from here to my apartment to change,”_ he’d argued, _“And you need to stay the Hell out of Ikebukuro, so…”_

Izaya had laughed it off, suggested that maybe he lift the ban. He’d prodded until Shizuo was huffy and pissed off, until they were bickering over “arbitrary rules that only matter to Shizu-chan” and Shizuo hadn’t even realized until hours later that Izaya had avoided making even one comment about his suggestion.

He types out a reply, clearing his mind of such troubling thoughts. He’ll yell at Izaya about that later. There’s no point in ruining another evening just because Izaya isn’t taking whatever the Hell is going on between them seriously.

_‘Running late. Asshole debtors. Bus is here.’_

Izaya doesn’t reply until he’s halfway to Shinjuku. He’s minding his own business, trying not to meet the nervous eyes of the other passengers as the bus lurches forward. His phone buzzes in his pocket. A little too eagerly, he pulls it out and checks it.

_Flea Bastard (09:35:49): Shizu-chan is such a neglectful lover._

He fights back a blush, thinking of anything but that word on the screen— _lover_. Is that what Izaya thinks? Is that what he’s calling them, even after everything?

They’ve been through a lot, sure, fighting and hatred, love and loss, so much se—

He has to stop himself there. This isn’t helping the heat cool from his skin at all.

Before he can even formulate a reply, his phone buzzes again.

_Flea Bastard (09:37:23): I hope Shizu-chan likes reheated takeout. Although, considering the stuff that I found in your pantry, it might be gourmet for you, right?_

Biting back a growl, he pushes just a little too hard against the buttons on his phone. He can feel the people around him moving away, surely terrified that the so-called _monster of Ikebukuro_ might lash out and maybe even flip the bus from the inside due to whatever must be pissing him off on that tiny, unassuming cellphone.

_‘Keep it up and I’m gonna be eating louse tonight.’_

Izaya doesn’t reply to that.

They’re even, he thinks. If Izaya can play dirty and call him names, start fights to avoid important steps forward in their relationship, then he’s allowed to harass him a little.

And he might, regardless, end up with a louse in his mouth after dinner. Izaya never buys good dessert anyway.  


* * *

 

  
Many, many miles away, in a small town in the Aomori prefecture, a young woman flips through bridal magazines, waiting patiently among a group of excited, cooing girls as their friend tries on different dresses in the fitting room of a fancy boutique.

She brushes wavy hair from her face, looking up only to send Bunko-san a kind smile, reaching across the space between their chairs and gripping gently at her wrist.

“Hanging in there?” Tachibana Tomoko questions softly, so quiet below the nervous tittering of Chiyo’s other bridesmaids that Bunko-san barely hears her at all, “It’s been a long day, but I have a good feeling about this dress, don’t you?”

Bunko-san returns her smile, albeit shyly. Kyou-san squeals excitedly from inside of the fitting room, pushy and entirely too eager to take her place as maid of honor and assist poor Chiyo with every minute task.

“This is the one, guys!” she howls, hopping three times in quick successions, her head popping up over the top of the door, “T-this one is beautiful! She looks like an angel!”

She can hear Chiyo’s laughter booming from the other side of the door. She’s telling Kyou-san to calm down, lest she hit her head or fall on the dress.

“I haven’t paid for it yet,” Tomoko can hear her lecturing, amusement heavy in her voice, “But I’ll have to buy it if you ruin it! Can you imagine me walking down the aisle in a dress with your footprints all over it?”

Kyou-san apologizes through her giggles, and Tomoko can’t hear anything that they’re saying after that. A long moment passes before they open the door, and she takes a chance to spare Bunko-san one last smile, pulling her hand away slowly before whispering, “You know that she’ll look beautiful in anything.”

Bunko-san nods, flushing only slightly.

When the doors to the fitting room open and Chiyo steps out, Tomoko knows that Kyou-san was right.

This dress is definitely the one.

She rises from her seat, teary-eyed as happiness swells in her chest.

“Oh, Chiyo,” there’s a lot of emotion in her words, and Chiyo sends her a damp smile, “It’s perfect.”

The crowd of bridesmaids grows around her. Everyone cheers, everyone seems a little emotional.

Somewhere, miles away, Tomoko thinks that Maki-kun and Hayashi-kun must be settling in for the night. She hopes that they’re happy, wherever they may be.

And she hopes, the slightest hints of nervousness tugging at her heart, that they’ll be back for the wedding.

If only so she can rest assured that they’re doing okay.  


* * *

 

  
Izaya grips shaking hands against the couch, thighs twitching and squeaking against the leather as he drops his head against the back. Shizu-chan is tucked between his knees, swallowing his aching erection as fingers tease at his backside.

He’s writhing desperately in that tight grip, digging teeth in to his bottom lip lest he let out any humiliating noises. Shizu-chan is still the worst person, even after they’ve done this so many times. He’d barely even touched his food before moving forward to touch Izaya. He’d barely even spoken a word before putting that stupid mouth of his to use in a highly inappropriate way.

Izaya hisses a curse, bucks into the warmth and wetness of that mouth as his fingers drag from the couch and into blond hair. He’s pulling at it so hard that he’s sure a few strands have come loose. Shizuo hollows his cheeks, trailing a hot tongue up the shaft as he pulls his head back.

Their eyes meet. Izaya hates him. His gaze, so hot, so blurred with need and pleasure—

Izaya cums hard, trembling and keening. He falls limply against the couch, not even having to look in Shizu-chan’s direction to know that he’s swallowed all of it.

He always does, the greedy monster.

Shizuo wipes his mouth on the back of his hand, leaving the other pressed right against a place that Izaya doesn’t even want to think about. There’s no lube in the living room, and if the brute thinks that he’s going to do anything without that—

“I want to move in together,” Shizu-chan says suddenly, and he’s serious, eyes hard with determination as his hand stays firmly in place, “I’m sick of coming all the way over here all the time.”

Izaya moves back, but Shizu-chan’s hand follows him. He’s using it to annoy him, he knows, to keep him rooted firmly in place in a sickening, perverted game of cat and mouse. He knows that if Izaya calls him out, he’s lost somehow. He knows that Izaya is too stubborn to lose at anything.

“Then stop making the trip,” he sighs, throwing a hand in the air, “Like I need a pervert over here every other night harassing me when I should be getting work done.”

Finally, Shizuo pulls away, but the look on his face is enough to make Izaya regret his words—even if he refuses to show it.

“I don’t understand why you’re being such an asshole about this.”

A silence stretches out between them. The air is stale, heavy with the scent of sex, with reheated dinner, with the stink of cigarettes on Shizuo’s clothes and remnants of the morning’s coffee. Izaya pulls his knees to his chest. He looks anywhere but at Shizu-chan.

“I’m not allowed in Ikebukuro, right?” Izaya asks finally, pressing awkwardly into the thickness of their silence, not quite sure if he wants to start a fight or not just yet, “Even if you moved here, you’d still have to travel back here every night. Your argument is full of holes, Shizu-chan.”

Shizuo curses softly, sits back on his heels. His face is red, his eyes swim with something so raw that Izaya finds it difficult to look at him.

When he finally speaks, Izaya really, truly wishes that he would just keep his big mouth shut.

“You can come to Ikebukuro then. I don’t care.”

The silence returns, smothering them like a thick blanket in the growing heat of his apartment. He thinks briefly of getting up and turning on the AC, but he’s naked from the waist down, having maybe the worst conversation he might ever have with Shizu-chan after such a rough day.

“This is a trick,” he counters, nerves concentrated right between his eyebrows, “Shizu-chan invites me to live in Ikebukuro again, and then what? I have to dodge vending machines on the way home every day? No thanks.”

Shizuo scowls, pulling himself to his feet. He stares down at Izaya, frown a firm line. His shoulders are tense with stress, and even if only for a moment, he feels guilty. He almost tells Shizuo what’s going on—how often the Awakusu group has been grilling him about their relationship, the many threats, growing only bolder as the days go on.

But something stops him. Maybe it’s knowledge that Shizuo won’t understand the weight of those threats. Maybe it’s the memories of so much blood pooling on Fukayama’s bedroom floor.

He stops. He bites his swollen lip, turns his head away.

“You were the one who was always bitching about me forgetting about you when we got home,” Shizuo spits, disgust obvious in his voice, the hurt, however, not so much, “And now we’re back and I’ve been trying to fucking move things along, and _now_ you’re deciding to have cold feet?!”

Izaya twitches, ever so slightly, but Shizu-chan sees.

He stiffens, straightens his back. He thinks that Izaya is afraid, they both know.

He thinks that Izaya is stupid enough to think that he’ll hurt him.

“I’m leaving.”

It’s nearly three in the morning. The busses aren’t running anymore.

Izaya doesn’t stop him. He watches as he gathers his things and goes, forgets to remind him of the milk in the refrigerator until it’s too late.

The door slams so loudly that it rattles what few pictures hang on his walls. His bookshelves clatter, his windows shake.

And he’s alone, in an empty apartment, wondering if he should get dressed and follow Shizu-chan out into the street, but knowing, deep down, that he’s not brave enough to face him.  


* * *

 

  
It takes a week for Izaya to contact him. They reconcile as well as they always do—fucking roughly in Shizuo’s apartment in the middle of the night, after Izaya showed up with nothing more than a bottle of milk and a shit-eating grin.

And time passes. The weeks carry on into months, and the months bring in a new year. They busy themselves with work, with spending the night at each separate apartment, and Shizuo tries his best to ignore how much of a pain it is. How irritating it is for Izaya to pull himself out of bed at the crack of dawn, if only to get to his meetings in Shinjuku on time. How annoying it is for him to have to do the same.

Tom-san notices when he’s had a long night. He feels like an irresponsible teenager, but he tries to ignore it. He tries to understand.

But he doesn’t, of course.

The aggravation bubbles up inside of him, threatening to explode if only someone pushes him in just the right way. He’s throwing debtors through windows before Tom-san can even speak a word. He’s tearing through the city with such vigor that sometimes he even gets sent home early.

And time passes.

Before he even realizes it, it’s March, almost a year since their first trip to Aomori.

Tom-san reminds him of his nearing vacation. Izaya brings him to a fitting for tuxedos. They visit a fancy little gift shop where Izaya selects a wedding gift. It’s something too expensive, he’s sure. He doesn’t have the will to pay too much attention to it. They travel beyond both of their separate districts to do these things, and only then does Izaya hold his hand.

He tries to understand. He tries to be nice.

It’s hard not to fight about it. It’s hard not to shake him, to demand an answer—

_“Why are you so embarrassed to be seen with me?! Why do all of our friends keep having to ask me if we’ve broken up?!”_

It’s overwhelming. It’s insufferable.

Ota-san texts him one day. He asks if he’s been doing well, when they’ll be in town. Izaya grumbles when he mentions the name, prickling visibly at Shizuo’s excitement, despite being so cold and distant all this time.

They pay for their plane tickets. They pack their things.

And before he even has time to think about it, they’re boarding the earliest flight to Aomori.  


* * *

 

  
In a high-rise office building very far away from Ikebukuro, in a room near the top floor, on a long, round couch in a tastefully decorated office, sits a hulking man—tanned skin, striking white teeth, scarred from head to toe with inky hair slicked back with plenty of product.

He watches a video from the computer on the coffee table, thanking the stout, balding butler who hands him his drink.

“Ota-san,” he calls, smile ominous and predatory, dark eyes trained on the video stream of two young men boarding a plane all the way in Tokyo, “Would you say that you miss Heiwajima-san?”

Ota-san hums nervously, shuffling to take his place next to Yuuki-san against the wall. He’s surely watching the blond man through the screen over his shoulder, surely worrying relentlessly about what his boss might have in mind for the only man to ever intimidate him.

“I-I do, sir,” Ota-san stutters, breathing hard behind him, “We text sometimes, but it would be wonderful to get to see him again.”

Koizumi chuckles, zooming in on the face of a dark haired man next to Heiwajima, drinking in those soft features that so betray the evil which lies beneath.

“Would you enjoy distracting him while they visit then?” he questions, which really isn’t a question, they both understand this, “I wouldn’t mind seeing Orihara-san again too, you know.”

Ota-san quivers, hesitates just a moment too long. He never liked Orihara-san, Koizumi understands. He thinks that his beloved stand-in-son deserves a better lover, someone so much kinder to service-workers than the sniveling brat of an informant.

Eventually, he responds.

“Of course, sir.”

It’s the sound of a man cutting his losses, allowing an enemy to take a hit in order to save his own skin. Koizumi barely conceals his widening grin, drawing his fingers over Orihara’s face on the screen.

“A relationship between a human in monster’s skin and a monster hiding behind the face of a human,” he muses, leaning back and spreading his arms over the back of the couch, “It wouldn’t work in reality, would it? They would surely tear each other apart.”

Yuuki-san stays silent, always watching, calculating his next move. Ota-san’s nerves give him away. Koizumi can see his frown in the reflection of the screen. He can see him wringing his hands.

“But which is which?” he sighs.

The sun hangs high in the air over the city. The chill of winter melts away momentarily, heat roving over the morning frost and warming the faces of chilly pedestrians.

Far above, Koizumi shuts his laptop, turns to send his butlers the most excited smile that they’ve ever seen from him before.

“Will Orihara-san kill Heiwajima-san first? Or will the monster finally live up to his title?”

And he laughs, and laughs, and he thinks to himself—

This will definitely be fun.  


* * *

 

  
They’re waiting for their layover flight when Izaya’s phone buzzes. Shizu-chan is buying something sweet from a restaurant in the lobby. He can see him waiting in line if he cranes his neck enough, and despite the distance already between them and Ikebukuro, he still doesn’t look away from him for too long. For now, he and the Yakuza are on good terms, but for how long?

They already suspect

 what’s going on, he knows. And it’s only a matter of time until they do something about it.

He checks his phone, sighing as he thinks of which clients might have forgotten that he’ll be out of town again. Before he can decide how snide his text to Namie about this will be, a familiar name catches his attention.

_‘Pervert’._

A cold dread spreads through his chest. He almost drops his phone, almost gets out of his seat and walks it right over to Shizu-chan, but he resists the urge. He’ll be working for Koizumi while they’re at the wedding, he tells himself. Shizu-chan, once again, will enjoy a nice vacation, and he’ll be exhausted with more and more work.

Someday, he tells himself, they’re going to travel somewhere where no one can make him do any work for at least a week. Maybe a month. Maybe he’ll even give up this stressful life of information sales for good.

Of course, he muses wryly, that’s never going to happen.

_Pervert (10:15:25): It’s been a long time, Iza-chan._

His skin crawls.

Before he can even slip his phone back into his pocket and ignore the message, just as he expected, it vibrates three more times, one after another, after another.

He almost turns it off, but Shizu-chan is at the back of a very long line. Morbid curiosity gets the best of him. He hates that he even cares what the old pervert has to say. He hates that maybe he’s hoping that Koizumi will try something again, if only so Shizu-chan can make good on his promise to strange him with his own spine.

_Pervert (10:16:05): Don’t tell me that you’re still mad about me teasing you._

_Pervert (10:16:37): Of course, if you decide to ditch the monster, I could tease you in an entirely different way. You’ll enjoy it. I promise._

_Pervert (10:17:02): You can’t deny that sometimes he touches you a little too roughly and you think of me. How gently I could take you, how discreet the marks I would leave on you might be. Not to mention…_

His phone buzzes a final time.

_Pervert (10:20:14): With my standing in the Yakuza, you wouldn’t have to worry so much about protecting me._

Of course, Shiki would tell him about that. It’s the only way that he could have known. Shiki betrays him in small ways, sending Koizumi to rile him up, feeding him information about his different phones, about the strange state of his and Shizu-chan’s relationship, even back then. Koizumi pretends to be all-knowing, but Izaya sees through him easily.

Surely, he’s sitting in his office watching them somehow, cackling like an evil villain and thinking that he’s untouchable.

But Shizu-chan’s fists do not understand the politics of the Yakuza. His fury does not comprehend who is dangerous and who is powerless. He rages, he destroys. He knows no fear but the fear of hurting those who don’t deserve it.

And unfortunately for Koizumi, he deserves the hardest punch that Shizu-chan can muster.

Reluctantly, he types out a reply. He despises every tap of his fingers against the keys. He dreads even the idea of texting the senile old fool again, after he’d told himself that very last day at the hospital that maybe, finally, he was free.

_‘You sound like someone who is very eager to get punched.’_

He can almost feel Koizumi’s laughter rattling through him. The sensation that overcomes him—like a thousand tiny hands roving over his naked body, like someone peeling back his many layers and looking just a little too closely at his insecurities—makes him feel sick.

Shizu-chan returns with a parfait and a salad. The latter, he refuses. He tells Shizu-chan that planes make him queasy, but it’s a shallow lie. Shizuo sees through him easily, huffing in annoyance about shitty selfish louses wasting his money.

“I didn’t ask you to buy me anything,” he quips, slumping against the bench that they’re sharing and watching as many people pass, “Shizu-chan needs to ask before wasting his money.”

Shizuo fixes him with a stern look. It seems as though he might say something, but he busies himself with his meal instead. Izaya watches as he eats, squashing the feelings rising inside of him—love maybe, happiness, the need to protect this idiot who probably thinks that he’s perfectly capable of protecting himself.

He tries not to think about the sound of those gunshots. He tries to tell himself that something like that will never happen again.

“Say, Shizu-chan,” he hums, ghosting his fingers over the crisp material of Shizuo’s sleeve.

Shizuo looks over to him, seeming to have forgotten all about their interactions just moments ago and only focusing on how good that his parfait must really be.

“Next year, we should take a real vacation,” he says, trying to nudge the eagerness out of his voice and failing miserably, “We could visit the mountains. We could go skiing.”

Shizuo grunts, shrugs his shoulders. He swallows slowly, looking out at the crowd around them.

“We could go to the beach,” he suggests casually, but Izaya knows better, “You have to leave those stupid jackets at home.”

He’s excited, Izaya can tell. There’s something inside of him that seems to spring to life at the suggestion, as though he’s been just waiting for Izaya to propose the idea. Izaya wonders if he’s dreading this as well. If maybe he considers this wedding to be more of a hassle than real time away from work.

He’s lost in his thoughts when Shizuo speaks up again. It’s so quiet that he almost misses it.

“We could go somewhere private, so uh… you wouldn’t have to worry about people seeing us together.”

Before he can comment on that or even consider the sting that it sends straight through his rib cage into his heart, an announcement calls out overhead. Their flight will be boarding soon.

They need to get going.

He promises himself that he’ll save this conversation for later. He’ll come back to Shizu-chan with a lie that will convince him that everything is okay, that he still loves him, that maybe they’ll live happily ever after, even if Izaya is struggling just to hold things together each and every day.

Shizu-chan throws his empty container in the garbage, scoffing in Izaya’s direction as he tosses the salad inside as well. They collect their carry-on bags and make their way to board.

Shizuo seems lighter, a certain bounce added to his step that Izaya doesn’t remember seeing before. He reassures himself that it has nothing to do with him, regardless of the thrumming of his heart at the mere idea of it. Regardless of how light Shizu-chan’s happiness makes him feel as well.

They file in line. They hand over their tickets. Everything takes too long, of course, but they’re used to it by now. He thinks about taking this flight for the very first time alone. He wonders what he might have been thinking back then, who he might have expected to meet in that hotel room when his flight landed and he'd met his butler for the first and last time.

Shizuo is looking around, zoning out. He might be feeling nostalgic too. He might be too excited to think about much of anything aside from meeting up with their old friends again.

As the line begins to move forward, Izaya reaches a free hand forward, lacing their fingers together and ignoring Shizu-chan’s surprised look with a determination that even surprises himself.

They’ll be okay, he tells himself. Shizu-chan is strong, he can take care of himself.

Like the last time, he’ll find himself surprised with what might happen.

But no matter what, they’ll face these things together.

That makes him feel better, somehow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After so much time has passed, I've finally returned with the sequel to Smoke and Mirrors! I've been so excited about this one, so much so that I've decided, after a lot of thought, that I'd make it multi-chapter as well.
> 
> A special thanks to lemoninagin and tumblr user frankenfishen for helping me come up with Chiyo's last name and the full name of her fiance. You guys saved me so much time. You really have no idea.
> 
> Anyway, I'm so ready to get this story going again! I hope that you guys enjoy it!


	2. Metamorphose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A new town with the same old skin.

The weather in Aomori is just as nice as Shizuo’s remembers. The air is somehow clearer than back home. The sun feels warmer. He draws in a deep breath, pausing outside of the airport and allowing the smallest of smiles to turn his lips.

Izaya bumps into his back, grumbling about “stupid thick-headed brutes” and pushing him out of the way.

“Don’t be an ass,” he huffs, picking up his bag from the ground and taking a few long steps to catch up, “It’s just a wedding. It’s not going to kill you, dumbass.”

Izaya throws a scowl over his shoulder, as though to show him just how much this trip is already killing him, and Shizuo knows that there’s still something that Izaya isn’t telling him. He decides not to question it for now. He’s going to let both of them enjoy their first day back in town.

He’ll pester Izaya more tomorrow.

Plus, the girls from the catering company will be there, of course, to help him.

Before he can become too engrossed in his thoughts, his phone begins to ring. Izaya jerks as though frightened, pats his own pockets to make sure that it’s not his. It’s troubling, at best, but he’ll have to save that suspicion for later as well.

There’s a name on the phone that causes heat to sweep over his skin:

_Ota-san._

He answers quickly, holding the phone to his ear and wondering how he should greet Ota-san. It’s been a long time since they’d spoken last, usually preferring to send a few texts back and forth once or twice a week, and he feels a little awkward standing here, fumbling with a greeting that might be appropriate in their given situation.

He doesn’t have to worry about it for too long. Ota-san understands him. His greeting is friendly. It’s warmer than anyone has greeted him in many, many months.

_“Heiwajima-san! Sorry to call unannounced! I hope that your flight went okay! I was actually wondering if you would like to have a meal together once you and Orihara-san get settled in. I understand if the flight has tired you out—“_

“No—uh, Ota-san, that sounds good,” He interjects, fiddling with his glasses in his nervousness, feeling suddenly out of place wearing his old clothes in a town that has only seen him dressed more casually, “Uh, I can meet you somewhere if you’d like...”

He spares a look in Izaya’s direction, watching as he hails a cab, turning back to usher him forward.

_“Yes, that would be spectacular! Would two hours be enough time?”_

He nods as he affirms this, ignoring Izaya’s sarcastic, surely jealous, laughter.

_“Fantastic! I’ll see you later then, Heiwajima-san!”_

 

Izaya had taken the liberty of booking them a hotel room. He tries not to admit that he’s a little disappointed that it’s not the same one where they stayed last time, but maybe Izaya can read it in his frown. He’s being laughed at for what feels like the millionth time since they left Ikebukuro this morning.

“Was Shizu-chan looking forward to another late-night dip in the pool?” Izaya’s eyes are alight with mirth, fingers hinting at his chin as he watches the buildings pass outside of the car window, “Or maybe you’re going to try to burn the room up again?”

There’s a bitterness to those last words which Shizuo doesn’t miss. He’s laughing too, despite himself, at the memories of Izaya squawking at the hotel staff, standing half-naked in their room over a burning pan of ramen noodles. It feels as though these memories are from years ago, distant and blurry, overwhelming and hazy. He feels as though he’s aged ten years since they’d stepped foot in this city that very first day.

And maybe he has. He’d went his entire life carrying out a stunted existence. He’d given up on changing himself, molding himself into the image of a respectable human being. He’d accepted the fact that he would always be different, always finding himself toeing the thin line between humanity and the monstrous strength that kept him on the outside, but then… something had changed within the walls of this city. Tom-san had noticed it the very first day. Vorona had looked at him when he’d returned to work as though he were an alien hiding away in human skin.

No one could quite put their finger on it, but Celty had asked him one morning nearly a month later, _‘Did you… change something?’_

He’d told her that he’d bought the wrong shade of hair dye, which wasn’t a lie. He didn’t have the heart to change the color again upon returning home and he definitely didn’t have the patience for it. Izaya threaded fingers idly through it at times, commented on the different shade, made a point of noting that sometimes animals will change their spots in a different environment.

 _“Still the same Shizu-chan,”_ he’d hummed, fixing that sharp stare on the curve of his jaw, seeming to drink in the lines of his face, the way that his hair framed it, _“Just a different place. So why haven’t your spots returned now that you have?”_

He wasn’t sure. Sometimes he didn’t feel like the same animal at all. Sometimes he found himself awake late at night, sitting up and lighting a cigarette as Izaya slept fitfully. He’d gaze out of the open window into the darkened city, and he would feel different. He would feel as though the world was no longer the blur of buildings passing too fast around him. He would feel as though somehow he’d finally caught up with it.

And maybe that was all Izaya’s fault.

Izaya was too quick at times as well, always a few footfalls ahead, always pulling him further faster than he’s ever been comfortable with. But sometimes Izaya would stop for him and wait. Sometimes he’d shut himself away in his apartment for days and refuse to return Shizuo’s phonecalls. Sometimes he’d show up in the middle of the night unannounced as though nothing was wrong between them, and somehow, Shizuo had found a routine in that.

He wonders if normal lovers have these problems, if maybe they’ve found themselves at the brink of their abnormality. If maybe there is nowhere left for them to go but to find their place in the regular world as regular people. Izaya seems dead-set on being weird forever. He shirks the responsibilities of their relationship, forgets the anniversaries and birthdays written clearly on his planner. Sometimes he starts fights just to watch them play out, and sometimes he argues just because Shizuo knows that he likes the “making up”.

Celty had asked him, months ago, _‘Is it hard, dating him?’_

And regardless of everything, he’d found the answer thrumming rhythmically in his chest.

_“No, not really.”_

Izaya is impossible sometimes. He’s obnoxious and insufferable, but… for some reason, that’s okay. Maybe there’s something wrong with both of their heads that makes this doomed relationship enjoyable somehow. Maybe they’ve both grown so attached to the violence between them that they can never manage to stay apart.

“Shizu-chan,” Izaya speaks, turning to send him a curious look, “You’re thinking too hard again, aren’t you?”

He shakes those thoughts away, concentrating on the hotel drawing closer in the distance. Izaya is drumming his fingers against the windowsill, letting out a quiet breath. He looks tired. He was up so late last night, organizing their luggage, making phone calls that Shizuo knows were anything but honest business. He’d fallen asleep only an hour before they needed to leave, and Shizuo had found himself wondering if it was worth it to endure Chiyo’s wrath if he’d just decided to call the entire thing off and let Izaya get some rest.

It’s all entirely too familiar: this city, the sights and smells and sounds, Izaya secretively cradling his phone with each incoming text, and the dark bags tugging at the bottom of his eyes. Izaya might not have slept for more than eight hours during their three-week stay last time. And once they’d returned home, the crash that Shizuo was expecting never came.

He picked up his work the very next morning, slipped back into the routine of his old life as though they’d never taken the trip at all.

It’s commendable, he thinks. Tom-san hadn’t let him return to work until he’d gotten his stitches removed.

Once they finally reach the hotel, they gather their bags from the back. Izaya’s luggage feels as though there might be a body stuffed inside. He’s dragging it like it isn’t heavy, and after watching his awkward shuffle from the street onto the curb, Shizuo snatches it from his hands.

“I’m not a lady, Shizu-chan,” he snaps, and despite the sarcasm in his tone, Shizuo knows that he’s a little offended.

“Coulda fooled me.”

Izaya clicks his tongue. He pushes his carry-on bag a little higher up on his arm, knocking shoulders with Shizuo as he passes.

The hotel isn’t nearly as nice as the one where they stayed before. It’s quaint in comparison, but nothing that Shizuo could ever imagine affording on his own. He feels a little like a character from a movie that he’d watched long ago. Like a woman swept off of her feet by a charming millionaire, but he doesn’t remember how the rest of that plot goes. Maybe they fall in love and he has a dirty secret. Maybe he’s insufferable from the very beginning and he keeps changing the goddamn subject every time that she asks if they can move in together.

He hangs back as Izaya checks in. He’s chatting up the girl at the counter as though Shizuo isn’t scuffing his feet awkwardly against the floor, impatient to get away from all of the eyes watching him and surely wondering if he works here.

The girl blushes darkly, and he swallows the jealousy rising like acid in his throat. His words prod at the back of his teeth, his lips quiver with the need to call over to Izaya and tell him to stop flirting and get a fucking move on it already.

Maybe he also wants to set the bags down and stomp over there. He might have considered grabbing Izaya by the shoulders and kissing him hard, marking his territory. He might have also wondered, a small voice poking out from the deepest crevices of his mind, if this is the sort of girl that Izaya would move in with. If maybe it’s not Izaya, but it’s him. If maybe they wouldn’t be having any problems at all if he weren’t the person who he is--blunt and tactless, destructive and stupid.

He wonders if Izaya snapped out of his daze after returning to Ikebukuro, if he finally got enough sleep and realized what a huge mistake he’d made by inviting Shizuo into his life.  

Shizuo snaps back to attention when Izaya turns around, sending the reddened girl a winning grin and a small wave over his shoulder. They’re on the first floor now, and the awkward elevator rides are definitely something that he is more than happy to keep in the past.

Izaya leads the way, hips swaying ever so slightly as he ambles down the long hallway toward their room. There are no cleaning ladies bustling about here. There are no doormen or bellhops hustling through throngs of guests. This hotel is more discreet, all business. Exactly the sort of place that he would expect for Izaya to pick.

The carpet is a velvety red. The lights hanging overhead cast an orange glow over the walls. The crimsons and golds of the color scheme seem far more welcoming than the stark white of the hotel before. He feels less like he might ruin everything that he touches, even though… that might be true here too.

Izaya stops, humming lightly, suddenly in high spirits after flirting with such a cute girl. Shizuo bristles at the thought, catches the open door with his elbow and shoves himself into the room.

Izaya can barely set down his carry-on before Shizuo has him pinned against the wall. He’s dropped their luggage in the doorway, barely able to close it before his muscles had acted on their own, throwing him forward toward Izaya, grabbing those sharp shoulders and holding him down.

“Shizu-chan is feeling excited already?” he questions, eyes scanning the room behind Shizuo’s head, searching, surely, for an out, “I haven’t even told you about the pool.”

He gasps Izaya’s cheeks as gently as he can muster, pressing their lips together, shaky and firm. Izaya squirms but doesn’t struggle. Shizuo is determined that he feels disgust there, that there isn’t a hardness pressing against his leg. That Izaya might really be regretting every decision which has led him here.

He’s trailing kisses down Izaya’s jaw, nipping at his neck and pressing his wrists against the wall. Izaya’s knees buckle beneath him. He’s upright only because of their bodies pushed together, he’s breathing so hard that Shizuo wonders if they can hear it through the wall in the other room.

“S-Shizu-chan,” he purrs, dark eyes half-lidded, cheeks pink with something that Shizuo refuses to believe might be need, “We… we have time.”

He can’t remember what Izaya means by that. He’s dragging a hand from Izaya’s wrist down to his chest, dipping it between their bodies and palming the erection tenting the front of Izaya’s pants.

Izaya arches his hips, leans into the touch. He’s huffing out tiny breaths, maybe asking for this, maybe just struggling to tell him to stop.

He’s unzipping the fly, pulling him out. He’s grasping a stiff erection in his fist, pumping, stopping only to draw a thumb over the head and relish the sounds that it drags from Izaya’s throat.

When Izaya cums, he’s shaking hard. He’s buckling in on himself, clutching so tightly at the front of Shizuo’s shirt that he worries that the fabric might tear.

And Shizuo is burying his face in the crook of his neck. He’s wrapping his arms around him, ignoring the sounds of traffic outside. Ignoring everything in the world around them except for Izaya’s thundering pulse against his skin and the wetness drying slowly on his hand.

“Izaya--”

His voice is ragged with stress, with the need still thundering through his veins. Izaya might have heard him, but he doesn’t respond. He sits there, pinned down. He runs a hand through Shizuo’s hair.

“I--” He bites back his words. He presses himself into Izaya’s shirt, muffling his insecurities, hoping that maybe he can smother them, “Don’t… don’t leave me.”

And Izaya stiffens. He’s pushing against Shizuo, clawing his way out.

He’s laughing, like he always does when Shizuo says the wrong thing.  
  


* * *

 

Izaya steps out of the shower, reaching toward the towel rack and tugging one of the obscenely fluffy towels toward him. He dries his hair, smearing the fog from the mirror and eyeing the marks that Shizu-chan left on his neck. Just like old times, he tells himself, ignoring the sour taste that it leaves in his mouth as he tries to suppress the memories of Shizuo clinging so helplessly to him.

He knows why, he understands everything. Shizuo is scared that he might leave. He’s afraid of what the future holds for them.

Well, good, he tells himself.

So is he.

There are three unread texts flashing the light on his phone. He clicks his tongue, fetches it from the neatly folded pile of his clothes. Two from Koizumi, one from Shiki.

This can’t be good.

Koizumi is going on about the usual-- _’Come visit me once the brute goes to bed, okay? I promise, I’ll be gentle’_ \--and he deletes the messages without a second thought.

His heart beats harder than it should be as he opens Shiki’s text. He feels as though a hand might reach through his phone screen at any second and grip him by the throat. He feels as though the floor might open and swallow him up, like maybe Shizuo won’t be waiting on the bed when he returns, flipping through the channels nervously and trying to pretend that Izaya didn’t practically fly out of the room as soon as he’d confessed just how scared he is to lose him.

What in the world is with him, anyway? He acts as though Izaya didn’t propose the idea to stay together, to travel here at all. He’s insecure, of course. He doesn’t understand the dangers lurking beneath the surface of Izaya’s reassurances. He can’t comprehend, surely, that Izaya needs to keep him safe--

_But why would he leave?_

He shakes his head, slipping his fingers through damp bangs and pushing them out of his face. His reflection glowers at him, dark circles prominent in unflattering light. His skin is dry. His hair feels thinner. His eyes, fearful and bitter, he doesn’t recognize them at all.

His finger hovers above Shiki’s message, pulse pounding in his throat. The world moves as though in slow-motion. He’s easing forward, pressing down, and--

The ringing of his phone jolts him out of his thoughts. He flings it across the room, nearly slipping over the puddles on the floor and tumbling down. He stretches out a trembling arm, steadying himself against the edge of the sink.

Against the foggy glass door of the shower, the blurry selfie of a woman smiles up at him. He doesn’t remember even getting her number, but surely, given the photo she’d chosen, it must have been during one of their drunken nights out. His head aches even thinking about it.

Shizuo doesn’t make any noise on the other side of the door, regardless of obnoxious clattering and Izaya’s fearful yelp as he’d nearly fallen down.

He might have stepped out for a cigarette. Or maybe he’s really heading home.

On the third ring, Izaya finally fetches his phone from the floor and answers it, noting with relief that it doesn’t seem to be damaged in any obvious way.

“Chiyo,” he sings, pushing back the annoyance and dread and pretending, despite the fact that so many things have happened, that he’s Maki-kun again, swiveling around in his desk chair and flirting with clients until they agree to buy more expensive catering packages, “It’s been quite a long time, hasn’t it?”

He can hear her laughter hissing through the speaker. He resists the urge to roll his eyes.

 _“Am I interrupting something?”_ she asks, _“That fake-friendly-Maki-kun voice isn’t fooling anyone.”_

He tucks the phone between his ear and shoulder, pulling his underwear from the sink and stepping inside.

“Of course not, my dear Chiyo,” which sounds a lot more forced. He pauses, clearing his throat and tugging his shirt over his head before continuing.

“You know that nothing is more important to me than the time I spend talking to you.”

She cackles at that, and he holds the phone a little further away from his face. He can hear her snort, and a man in the background tells her to calm down.

_“Of course, of course, Orihara-san. Have you dug up any dirt on my good-for-nothing fiance like I asked?”_

They joke like this for a few more minutes, as he combs his hair and brushes his teeth. She’s telling him about a bridesmaid who won’t stop complaining, about her fiance’s family arguing about which flavor they should make the cake. He might have expected for her to be riddled with nerves, more similar to Godzilla than a bride, but she’s calm, as usual. Nothing seems to have the ability to rattle her.

 _“How is Shizuo-kun doing?”_ she asks after a while, and he knows that she’s been skirting around it this entire time. Nosy, always so, so nosy, _“I’ve been waiting to get a wedding invitation from you guys for a long time, you know. He hasn’t asked yet?”_

Izaya clicks his tongue. He straightens out his shirt, throws a glare over his shoulder at the door.

“Shizu-chan is Shizu-chan,” he replies, “Bullheaded and stupid as always.”

She snickers, making some stupid comment like _“but you love him anyway”_ , which finally causes him to roll his eyes. She’s a fangirl, still, after all this time. He’s really not sure what he should have expected from her.

He pushes open the bathroom door, running out of excuses to stay hidden away inside. It’s only Shizuo in the room, he tells himself. There are no men with guns, just one person. Just Shizu-chan, moody and rash, impatient and maybe a little hurt.

Somehow, that realization doesn’t make him feel any better.

 _“Can you do me another favor?”_ She asks, and he almost tells her that only the first favor is free, even for the bride, _“You’ve probably done something to piss off Shizuo-kun, right? That’s why he’s not harassing you about who you’re talking to?”_

He spares a look in Shizuo’s direction, noting those white knuckles gripping an unfortunate throw pillow, the stiff line of his jaw, the sharp edges of his eyes.

“I’m not entirely sure if that’s any of your business,” he counters, but he knows that he’s just proving her right, “And even if I had…?”

There’s a short pause, an amused snort crackling through the line as the man in the background says something that he can’t quite make out.

 _“Alright Iza-kun,”_ she says, and he can feel the conversation slipping through his fingers, tipping instantly into her favor, _“Why don’t you go cuddle with him for a bit? Try to be nice, okay? I want you guys to be all over each other at my wedding.”_

She doesn’t give him a chance to argue before the line clicks and dies.

He lets out a long sigh, tossing the phone on the nightstand and throwing himself down on the bed next to Shizuo. They don’t exchange any words, Shizuo doesn’t ask who he was talking to. He doesn’t ask what might be going on in his head after such a strange outburst. They settle into a silence that might not be quite as uncomfortable as it should be. They watch an old game show on the television, and he feeds Shizuo the answers moments before the contestants can reply.

“I’m not leaving, Shizu-chan,” he speaks, just as the program switches to the commercials and the spell binding them to silence seems to be broken, “I understand that everything has been… strange lately, but I’m not leaving.”

Shizuo snakes an arm around him, pulls him close. He still doesn’t speak, but the frown tugging at his lips seems looser. His eyes look less hard.

“Once you get back from visiting Ota-san, maybe I’ll return the favor from earlier?”

Shizuo twitches a little at that, and within moments, Izaya finds himself pinned to the mattress underneath him. Their lips touch, light and gentle. Shizuo is holding him as though he might break, as though he’s sand, slipping slowly through his fingers, and he isn’t quite sure how to hold him here without ruining him.

“Shizu-chan,” he hums, voice vibrating against Shizuo’s skin, sending tiny trails of electricity skittering between them, “I’m not leaving you. That’s not what all of this is about.”

Shizuo pulls back. He looks down with guarded eyes, brushes the damp hair from Izaya’s face. He looks as though he might say something, but lets out a short breath instead. He’s biting off each argument, each question that Izaya knows will lead only to, _“Then what is it? What aren’t you telling me?”_

He shakes his head, twines his fingers in blond hair. Their eyes meet for a split second before Shizuo looks away, cheeks red, biting his lip.

“Then promise me,” he whispers, voice raw with whatever it is that’s charging these insecurities, “Promise me that you’ll tell me when you’re leaving me.”

He’s pulling himself away when Izaya catches him by the shoulder, pulls him down into another kiss. Laughter is bubbling from his lips--nervous, eager.

_‘If I could tell you what has been going on, I would. If I could trust you not to do something stupid, Shizu-chan--’_

“I’m not leaving, so why would I need to promise that?”

He focuses on the bared teeth, the curse of his name slipping through the calloused cracks of Shizuo’s lips. He watches the tremors shuddering through those strong shoulders. He takes in the smell of smoke, the cologne, the sweet flavor lingering now on both of their lips, and all of these tiny details that compose a man like Heiwajima Shizuo.

“But I promise,” he sighs, “If only to appease you.”

_‘I would tell you everything if I could.’_

Shizuo seems pleased enough with that. He might say something, might pull Izaya into another kiss, but his phone is ringing once the thoughts begin to play across his face, and Izaya is left wondering if maybe that’s for the best.

“Ah, yeah, I’m leaving now,” Shizuo ruffles a hand through his hair before grabbing his wallet and hotel keys from the bedside table, “I’ll be there soon.”

Izaya watches him go, feigns casualness as he spreads out across an impossibly wide bed. He waves Shizuo off, accepts his kiss goodbye.

And once the door closes, he finally risks a look at Shiki’s text.

_‘I would tell you, if only I knew that you wouldn’t leave me if I did.’_   
  


* * *

 

Ota-san looks a little grayer around the edges, maybe a little thinner, but he’s still the same Ota-san.

Shizuo steps into the restaurant nervously, one hand ghosting above the package of cigarettes bulging in his pocket, one hand hesitating on the handle of the door. He worries for a moment that he’s come to the wrong place, almost checks the address on his phone one last time, but then he’s spotting a familiar face at a table near the back, waving at him and smiling like he’s the sort of person worth smiling at.

A waitress greets him as he passes through. She calls him _‘sweetheart’_ , and for a single beat of time, he’s out of place here again. This city is a foreign place filled with people who don’t understand the danger creeping through. This is a new reality entirely, a reality in which he isn’t a monster, a person worth fearing. A reality in which he’s a normal human meeting up with an old friend in a busy diner. Someone not worth even a second glance.

He draws in a deep breath. Ota-san stands as he reaches the table.

Aomori is a breath of fresh air. Aomori, once again, embraces him without a second thought.

“You look good,” Ota-san says, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a smile, “These are your normal clothes, but I have to say, you look very different wearing them here.”

Shizuo forces out something that might be a laugh. He’s not used to it, of course, but Ota-san doesn’t seem to notice. He tries to slip back into the skin of Hayashi-kun, a person not so different from himself, but he finds that he can’t pretend to be him anyway. He can’t be a normal person, and Ota-san might not even want him to be.

“How’s your family?”

Ota-san pauses to sit. He shuffles into his own seat, fingers tapping against the glossy surface of the menu. There are two drinks on the table already--a half-empty soda and a tall milkshake, gathering condensation as it melts.

“They’re doing well,” Ota-san speaks, something soft washing over his features, “My daughter made good marks in each of her classes and my son is…”

Shizuo feels his heartbeat filling the silence between them. He feels the air passing slowly from his lungs. He wonders if Ota-san is disappointed in his son at times, if maybe he wishes that he could have been normal. He wonders if sometimes Ota-san looks at him and fears for their family, if maybe he sees the shadow of a dark future for his innocent child every time that they find themselves face to face.

“He’s working very hard,” Ota-san says finally, taking a quick drink from his glass, “We have him talking to someone once a week. He’s improved a lot. He says that he wants to be a bodyguard like Papa’s friend when he grows up.”

Warmth flows through Shizuo’s veins. His muscles feel as though they’re made of rubber. His hands bump clumsily against the slippery edges of his glass. He doesn’t know how to thank Ota-san for ordering his drink. He doesn’t know how to thank him for always looking at him in the way that a person looks at a friend.

He doesn’t know how to thank him for anything, really, and so he stays quiet.

“I’m sorry,” Ota-san laughs, cheeks tinted pink as he fiddles with his menu, “When he’s feeling insecure, I tell him stories about you. He might have gotten the idea that you’re some sort of superhero.”

Shizuo wonders briefly what Ota-san might be telling his son about him. Taking a few bullets to the chest and living? But he’d flailed so pitifully that night, fallen down and bled out and scared everyone half to death. He’d tamed the rabid beast that is Orihara Izaya, but he doubts that Ota-san would be telling his son tales about walking in on them getting busy in their hotel room.

Just as he’s about to ask, the waitress nears their table. Neither of them are ready, and she laughs, telling them to take their time.

“How are things with Orihara-san?”

He thinks back to Izaya pinned beneath him on the bed. He tries not to remember whispering those needy things against his skin. He thinks about the passing of a year, of spending holidays together, clinging to each other late in the night. He thinks about their few dates, about Izaya’s birthday, about arguing and making up, the struggles of dating an asshole, and before he can stop himself--

“We’re good,” he says, wondering why it doesn’t feel like a lie, “We’re doing well.”

And Ota-san smiles, but there’s something fearful swimming in his eyes.

Shizuo doesn’t mention it. He isn’t sure if he wants to know.  
  


* * *

 

Izaya silences his phone.

He watches as the numbers illuminate and die, listens to the creaks of the elevator as it carries him upward toward the top floor. The remnants of cologne, of coffee and the sweat of bodies hang in the air. The air conditioning raises goose pimples along his skin.

Shiki might not need to be in Aomori to kill him, he muses. He might be able to do it easily enough from the comfort of his own living room.

All that it takes is a text to his old friend, the return of a favor, the request for someone disgusting and sinister to wrap his claws around Izaya’s throat and squeeze.

Those slimy hands inch their way through his thoughts, through the history in his phone. The smile of an old pervert slices through his memories, sharper than any knife in his collection.

The final number on the wall lights up. The doors slide open with nothing more than the silent displacement of air.

He steps into the room, notices the slick black hair of a man seated with his back to the elevator. He remembers the couches from last time, wrapping around the coffee table like a snake strangling prey.

“Orihara-san,” a voice calls, a gunshot breaking through the thick quiet around them, “It’s so kind of you to meet with me, and so soon after arriving.”

As though in slow-motion, the figure seated on the couch turns. His smile, the slices of a jagged jack-o-lantern’s grin, glints up at Izaya. His fingers slide against the back of the couch.

“If I didn’t know any better,” he continues, velvet-voiced, cocky and insufferable as Izaya can never seem to forget, “I’d think that you were eager to see me.”

“Shiki-san seemed to think that this was important,” Izaya replies, pushing down the feeling of nasty little hands roving along his skin, of those dark pebbles of eyes peeling open his clothes and peering underneath, “But if you’ve just called me here to joke, I do have more important matters to attend to.”

Koizumi barks a laugh. He doesn’t move from his position, despite how tangled his body looks, turning halfway to grasp at the back of the couch.

“Really? Like watching cable in an empty hotel room? Calling Heiwajima-san back to pound you into the mattress?”

He twitches ever-so slightly at the jab. Koizumi drinks it in, grin broadening until it seems to crack open his face. His teeth are stark white against brown skin. His wrinkles and scars tug upward, brows high in his hairline.

“I can’t imagine why that would matter to you, Koizumi-san.”

Koizumi sighs, ordering more than inviting him to come sit down. He does so only because his knees are knocking, rage shaking his fingertips in his pockets. He isn’t sure how much of this he can take before he’s slicing open the pervert’s jugular.

As soon as he sits, a serious air takes over the room. Koizumi’s smile disappears so quickly that he isn’t sure if it was ever there at all. He turns in his seat, hands against his thighs. He’s staring at the table, his reflection clear against the glossy surface, as though he’s calculating his next words very carefully.

“You’ve agreed to work for me again,” He starts, slipping his gaze from the table, to the couch, burning those eyes over Izaya’s body before reaching his face, “And I have another job for you.”

He shouldn’t be surprised, really. The grimy underbelly of the city never sleeps. The bad people never stop for naps.

And so, neither does Orihara Izaya.

“This job requires a certain amount of discretion, you see.”

His heart thumps so loudly in his chest that he wonders if Koizumi can hear it too. His shirt clings to the sweat accumulating between his shoulders. In his throat, the words that he might say are congealing into a lump of nervousness, a ball of every refusal, every curse and insult pressing the oxygen from his lungs.  

“I’m sure you understand,” Koizumi continues.

He doesn’t want to hear his next words. He thought that he’d buried those horrible memories so deep within his psyche that not even the most talented therapist could unearth them.

“But I’ve taken the liberty of picking out your disguise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A special thanks to ichimatsusama for helping me edit this chapter! I feel so much more confident posting it, knowing that... maybe the typos are a little less obvious. haha!
> 
> Also, I didn't realize that I'd made this story complete? Whoops. It's fixed now, silly me.
> 
> The ominous build here though... it's been killing me... 'What will Koizumi do?' 'What is his next plan for revenge?' 'How does he plan on torturing Izaya this time?'
> 
> ....
> 
>  
> 
> He's gonna make him cross-dress again. 
> 
> hahaha! 
> 
>  
> 
> Anyway, thank you so much for reading this far! I hope it's been okay! Next chapter, the catering girls return! And so does the care-free atmosphere, hopefully!


	3. Imbroglio

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A lot more headache with a lot less sleep.

Sawamatsu Hayato: 37 years old, 104 kg, 170.18 cm. A big man with big tastes. A greedy lowlife with eyes bigger than even his stomach. A petty thief, maybe. Someone with a grudge against Koizumi’s group, with just enough men to back him up that he’s virtually unreachable. 

Really, Izaya tells himself, this sort of grunt work is so far below his pay grade that he shouldn’t have even considered it.

Heaving in a heavy sigh, he catches sight of himself in the reflection of the mirror. Fluffing the itchy wig, then dragging a finger over the gloss that’s strayed from his lips. He cocks his hip to the side, practicing a gait that is anything but natural. He feels bloated beneath this stuffy outfit. He feels like he’s wrapped in so many layers that he might suffocate. 

The breasts, silicone rubbing uncomfortably against his collarbones and armpits, the hips, fastened from God-knows-what and strapped tightly to his sides. He didn’t even know that curves could be manufactured. His reach of information has never strayed to such superficial territories.

There’s a buzzing in his pocket. He works the tension from the middle of manicured brows, rubs excess mascara from under his eyes.  
  


__ ‘Pervert (10:05:23): Maybe if you show Sawamatsu-san a good time, he’ll give you a big tip.’  
  


Disgusting.

He isn’t sure how difficult it’s been for the old moron to capture Sawamatsu so far. He must have ties to this restaurant, seeing how he’d thrown Izaya here mid-shift, dressing him up in this ridiculous uniform and drawing him up a temporary schedule. The manager had bowed to each of them, knees knocking so hard that he’d almost hit the floor. He’d apologized to Koizumi for the inconvenience, which not only made zero sense, but… 

He chooses not to think about that. He’s wearing  _ pantyhose _ , of all things. He’s working an overnight shift at one of Shizu-chan’s kind of diners — the sort with greasy burgers and free-dinner rewards for those who can eat a certain amount of B-grade meat within the time period on a stopwatch, and he definitely isn’t tucking himself into a gigantic, comfortable bed with his lover and spending a relaxing night catching up on much-needed sleep. 

He pinches one of his cheeks, pulling himself forcefully out of his musings about the use of the word  _ lover _ , of all things, and he tells himself that the sooner that he makes his rounds to Sawamatsu’s table, the sooner he can gather Koizumi’s information and make his way back to the hotel. 

Before he collects the menus and makes his way to the dining area, he types out two separate texts. One to Shizu-chan, warning him not to stay up waiting, and one to Koizumi:

_ ‘Is tipping customary in Aomori, Koizumi-san? Your jokes seem to be lacking in fervor. Could it be that you’re becoming senile in your old age?’ _

He ignores the following buzzing, slipping his phone back into his pocket and gathering his things. Orihara Izaya doesn’t get his hands dirty. Orihara Izaya has never lowered himself to the task of taking orders from anyone, and he definitely does not take orders from shady customers in a dive such as this. 

He doesn’t do menial labor. He doesn’t wash dishes or clean tables. He doesn’t plaster on a fake smile for anything other than furthering his own agenda. 

Unfortunately, as his name tag indicates,  _ Miyako _ does.  
  


* * *

 

Shizuo checks his phone when he returns to the hotel.

He waves goodbye to Ota-san as he exits the car, stumbling over the curb and scratching nervously at the back of his head. He nods to the doorman in greeting, slipping back into the familiarity of his surprise and remembering the way that Izaya had always chided him for being so friendly with the service workers. Some things never change, he thinks. If Izaya were here, he can clearly imagine his dramatic eye-roll, the way that he would huff as though deeply offended by Shizuo’s manners. 

He tries not to make eye-contact with the giggly girl at the front counter, keeps his head down as he passes people in the hall.

And when he opens the door to his room, remembering to lock it behind him only after noticing that Izaya is no longer lounging on the bed, he chances a look at his phone.  
  


__ One Unread Message (10:15:43): Flea Bastard   
  


With a grumble, he clicks the message. The photo takes less than a second to load. He’s left with more questions than answers, until the image of Izaya dressed in some depraved version of waitress’s garb jumbles with year old memories, with the snide grin of an old pervert, and the many jobs that the little bastard had dressed up in first time that they’d found themselves in Aomori. 

He clenches his fist so hard that his phone crackles, Izaya’s hollow smirk flickering on the screen until he reminds himself not to break his only connection to his friends back home.

_ Koizumi. _

And the little bean sprout bastard is working for him _ again _ . 

The cogs lurch forward in his mind, gears scraping as he struggles to piece together Izaya’s strange behavior, his ties reconnecting with the one man who he swore that he would never speak to again, the eagerness with which he suggested traveling back here, and…

No, he tells himself. Izaya hates Koizumi. He can’t stand to be around him. He spent weeks snarling at any incoming messages on his phone, but… Izaya is a good liar. He hides cards below the table. He slips in his kings while your head is turned away, never giving any hint of the cheater’s deck he might have been sitting on all along.

He shakes the thoughts away. He tries to remember the last time that he caught Izaya staring at his phone for too long. He tries to trudge up any recollection of a weird phone call, an odd email, but everything that Izaya does is suspicious. There isn’t a single business transaction of his that Shizuo has witnessed that could be considered anything but dubious.

This isn’t it, he tells himself. His gut is aching. _ This is all wrong _ . Izaya isn’t working for Koizumi because he wants to, it has to be something more. He has to have gotten himself wrapped up in something so big that he’s using the old bastard to cover his tracks. He has to be paying back a favor somehow.

He tries to recall how Izaya got stuck working with him in the first place. The Yakuza, that scary guy in the nice suits, the scarred one with a glare that could stop a man’s heart if he willed it to. Shizuo feels a tremor inching up his spine at the mere thought of it — of Izaya, caught up in something too big to shoulder alone. Izaya, struggling to keep it together despite how much he might need help. 

He thinks of Izaya running fingers over his chest in slow circles. He thinks of those black eyes in the night, heavy-lidded, his cheeks tinged with color. He thinks of Izaya falling asleep in his arms.

He sends a text. Four words. Eighteen letters.  
  


__ ‘Take care of yourself.’  
  


And he waits, and waits, and not until morning does he hear his phone buzz with a reply.

 

* * *

 

“Who would have thought that a dive like this would have such pretty girls on staff?” 

Izaya forces a smile, willing his cheeks to redden with anything but tightly withheld rage as he ducks his head in mock-embarrassment. His voice isn’t quite willing to raise itself high enough to be convincing, and when he asks for their orders, a few of Sawamatsu’s men exchange suspicious glances. He almost finds an opening to slip away, almost sends Koizumi an urgent text for help, but before he can do much of anything, a meaty hand creeps up the stockings on the back of his thighs, slipping upward and upward until fat fingers dig into the lacy edges of his panties.

He flinches, taking many tiny breaths, struggling to keep his heart rate even and his mask firmly in place. His knife feels like a tonne of bricks, tucked under the strap against his thigh. Sweat beads at his hairline. He swallows the growing lump in his throat, forcing down the jitters in his words.

“O-oh, please sir, I’m not off for another three hours,” he draws out, the breathiness of his words easily mistaken for lust in this stupid man’s equally stupid ears, “You can’t tease me or… my boss might get mad.”

The hand slides away. There’s a hungry grin beaming up at him, yellowed teeth glinting in the overbearing light overhead — each wrinkle standing out starkly under the flickering fluorescent bulbs as he wills himself not to chop those greedy fingers off one by one.

Each man orders a dish, and Izaya scribbles them down in a pad from the kitchen. He wonders if the movies are accurate, if there really is some sort of slang that the kitchen staff can translate to a certain dish, but he pushes those useless thoughts away. Sawamatsu orders last. Izaya almost expects for him to ask  _ “Are you on the menu?” _ , but he settles for something greasy, something filled with so many calories that Izaya feels as though he’s having a sugar crash just from writing it down.

Those eyes never leave his body. He can feel them burning up his legs as he walks back to the kitchen. 

When he ducks inside, he hangs up the order slips for the cook. No one seems to be working too hard, but he’s not particularly eager to carry the food back out. He watches as they talk through the window. Sawamatsu laughs, throwing back his head and sliding backwards in his chair. His belly rumbles with his laughter. One of his men shuffles uncomfortably in his seat. The other two look around, eyeing the few other patrons. 

He checks his phone. Shizu-chan has only texted him once, a simple warning, and he clicks his tongue. Koizumi’s messages are adding up — important information and directions shuffled in between depraved suggestions, and his head pulses with stress.

He just wants to sleep. His entire body aches with the need to find the softest surface and curl up on top of it.

Sawamatsu Hayato, 37 years old. The leader of a relatively new group called  _ Dragon’s Flame _ _ — _ Izaya rolls his eyes, setting his phone down for a moment to compose himself. 

Lecherous, unimaginative, handsy. His least favorite kind of human.

With a heavy sigh, he brings the phone back to his face, leaning against the counter as he skims through Koizumi’s more useless messages to gather information.

Sawamatsu’s group specializes in smuggling weapons from Russia and selling them to a collection of smaller gangs outside of city limits. Their front, a series of dingy restaurants in the red light district, is directed by a man by the name of Tokaji Eito. Koizumi doesn’t seem to have any information about this man aside from a name, and already, Izaya’s skin prickles with the realization that he might be headed to the more unsavory parts of town for his next job.

The ding of a bell jars him out of his thoughts. He turns to find that the meals are completed, sitting innocently enough on the counter and just waiting for him to run them out. His stomach lurches at the mere thought of it. He can still feel the heat of that hand running over his skin. Not even Shizu-chan touches him like that.

The color pooling his cheeks is from nothing but anger, he tells himself. It has nothing to do with the thought of Shizuo drawing nimble fingers over the back of his naked legs. It’s annoyance, not the image of Shizu-chan’s brutish paws drinking in every curve of his body, as though feeling him for the very first time —

He clears his throat. His phone buzzes one more time. It’s a mistake to check it, and he realizes this only after his eyes catch the name, and the only words that could have possibly made him regret agreeing to work for Koizumi more than he already has.  
  


__ ‘Shizu-chan (11:05:43): I love you.’  
  


It’s going to be a long night. 

 

* * *

 

As the sun hints at the edge of the city and Izaya wipes coffee rings from each of the tables in the dining room, Sawamatsu and his group finally rise to leave. It’s five minutes before the end of his shift, but he pretends to forget about the seconds ticking away on the clock. The sticky mess on a booth near the back becomes suddenly very interesting, even as those horrible eyes drag themselves from his feet to his shoulders, taking special care to linger on the side of his face for a little too long.

He hears the bell ring as they leave, letting out the breath that he doesn’t remember holding. The chef is asleep at the counter as he slips into the back room, untying the bow of his apron behind his back. His shoulders feel stiff from carrying so much weight for so long. The straps of the bra have worn angry red patches against his skin. He tries to recall when Chiyo had asked to meet up later today, wondering if he’ll have enough time for a nap before they have to leave.

He wonders if Shizuo got any rest at all. He worries entirely too much. Even without inhuman strength, Izaya is perfectly capable of taking care of himself. By the third vending machine that he’d lugged in Izaya’s direction, he really should have gotten the idea.

With a laugh that he refuses to believe is because of anything but his own skill and Shizu-chan’s bumbling attempts to thwart him, he hangs the apron on the wall, fetching his clothes from under the counter and trekking toward the bathroom.

He eyes the marks against his skin in the mirror, contemplating charging Koizumi extra for all of his pain and suffering. Slipping off the panties and stepping into his underwear, he tries to ignore the way that his body wobbles tiredly forward and back. He tries to convince himself that he’s fine. 

Two days without sleep isn’t going to be the end of the world.

He imagines how warm the bed will be when he returns to the hotel. Shizu-chan’s body is a furnace. The blankets will be almost unbearably hot.

The image of Shizuo sprawled out on the mattress pools in his thoughts. Those long arms outstretched, his t-shirt riding up to expose a slowly rising belly. Big feet tangled in the blankets, lips open, breathing out the softest snoring that Izaya thinks is (in)humanly possible. The sun might be peeking through the curtains, illuminating blond hair in a golden halo, specks of lint lighting up in the air like glitter, framing that peaceful face as though Izaya might be peering into a dream world.

Shizu-chan surely doesn’t understand how preferable he is in slumber. He surely can’t comprehend how angelic one might consider him, if they didn’t know any better.

A sleeping lion, surely. Beautiful, but deadly. 

He chalks up this upsetting train of thought to mere exhaustion. He wouldn’t be comparing Shizu-chan to anything but a dragon guarding treasure or a troll under a bridge if he were more coherent. 

He’d contemplating the sort of treasure that Shizuo would be guarding as he clocks out and heads for the door. Sweets, maybe, but Shizu-chan wouldn’t be able to resist the urge to eat them. His hoard would be dwindled to nothing in a matter of hours.

Street signs and vending machines, his bartender’s uniforms, or those idiotic sunglasses that he always perches on the bridge of his nose. These are the things that come to mind at first, but nothing quite seems good enough to be treasured by someone like Shizuo. 

He tries to imagine what Shizuo holds dearest, above all else. Something that he would refuse to let go. Something that he would feel the need to protect regardless of the circumstances. Something that Shizuo loves more than anything else —

Before he can react, a hand is pushing him back against the side of the building. It takes him a moment to realize that he’s outside, the chill of the morning nibbling at the tips of his ears as the heat of a bigger body presses him against the bricks.

His eyes snap toward the other man’s face, taking in the beady eyes, the food clinging to the corners of his mouth. His breath reeks of coffee and whatever that heart attack on a plate might have contained earlier. His suit is spotted with tiny stains of food.

Sawamatsu smiles down at him, flecks of food tumbling down between them as his cheeks tug upward and his canines poke out under the edges of his lips.

“Miyako-chan,” he purrs, the words rumbling straight through skin and tingling against Izaya’s bones, “You look so much prettier without the  _ accessories _ .”

He draws his gaze over Izaya’s chest, to his hips, between his legs. His clothes feel too tight. His skin feels oily and far too uncovered, even under his jacket, and his regular shirt and pants. Those eyes linger on the exposed line of flesh where his shirt meets his pant-line, riding up as his body leans awkwardly against the wall. He forces a smile to his lips, nudges something sultry into his words. He needs a bath. Breakfast, a nap, and a shower so long that the entire hotel runs out of hot water.

“I’m so happy that you waited for me, sir,” the lie twinges somewhere deep inside of his chest, “I was so sad when you didn’t even leave your number on the table for me.”

It’s a stretch, he thinks. No one would be gullible enough to believe such an obvious lie. A man sneaky enough to do his dirty business away from home would surely —

“I saw you checking me out earlier. I knew you were interested in what I had to offer.”

It takes a tremendous amount of strength to resist rolling his eyes. He imagines that not even Shizu-chan would be monstrous enough to achieve it. 

“O-of course. I was too shy to ask, but…”

The sentence hangs in the sparse space between them. He wishes that he were anywhere else but here. Back in Ikebukuro, watching as the timer counts down on the coffee pot, waiting for Shizuo’s nose to crinkle as he drags himself out of bed. In their shared hotel room, kicking off the blankets as Shizuo’s body heat simmers against his skin, kissing small patches of milky collarbone and nipping only when it’s gotten too hot and the rumbling of his stomach becomes too much to ignore. 

He tries not to focus on all of his fantasies involving Shizu-chan. He isn’t a useless maiden waiting for her white knight to arrive and save her. He’s a feared informant gripping the handle of a knife inside of his jacket pocket, waiting for the chance to stain the concrete with a pervert’s blood.

“Of course,” Sawamatsu chuckles, pulling back and fumbling with something in his pocket, “A cutie like you shouldn’t have to ask.”

Izaya wonders what sort of tastes a man like Sawamatsu has. He wonders if the mischievous glint in Koizumi’s eyes as he’d assigned this job might have been because he was pushing off a client somehow even more depraved than himself on the one person who’d had enough his nonsense to last three lifetimes. 

A business card is thrust into his vision, and it takes him only a second to notice the writing scrawled on top of it. Sawamatsu clicks his pen, shoving it back into his pocket. Izaya silently hopes that it will explode in there, a petty revenge, but maybe all that he can afford until his job is finished.

He takes the card slowly, reminding himself to smile, to be shy, to bat his mascara-heavy eyelashes and to tuck the card away in a manner that might imply that he would ever be interested in looking at it. It will find its way straight to Koizumi’s files, maybe after Izaya picks apart the messy signature. After he runs the numbers through his head and considers just what Koizumi might have planned for such a lowlife. 

Sawamatsu stands straighter, backing up to give him some space to move. He brushes down the rumpled edges of his shirt, fiddling with the zipper of his jacket and wondering what the cross-dresser of Sawamatsu’s dreams might say at this particular moment in time. Maybe they would blow a kiss, send him a meek smile. Maybe they would invite him out for breakfast, despite the meager amount of people making their way to work, or the fact that the bastard just finished eating less than half an hour ago.

They would sit and drink coffee. Sawamatsu would invite them home. He inwardly cringes at the mere thought of it.

“Next time,” Sawamatsu says, sending a nod to the men waiting a few meters away, who Izaya regrettably realizes that he hadn’t noticed until just now. “You can lose the accessories, but those legs are too nice to stay hidden like that, got it?”

Indignant, he nods. It’s a wrestling match, biting his tongue, swallowing the seething reply which threatens to tumble out if only this moron decides to boss him around any further. 

_ “They’re nice for fucking flea legs,”  _ Shizu-chan had told him once while they lounged in bed, face flushed as he’d run his knuckles over Izaya’s knees,  _ “You’re hiding four more of them somewhere, aren’t you?” _

He hates that this memory has chosen to resurface now, despite so many more important things going on. Despite Sawamatsu waving a cocky goodbye, despite the ghost of touch still hot against his skin. He hates that his cheeks are pink with anything but disgust, that he isn’t even awake enough to deny that Shizu-chan’s half-assed compliment had caused vibrations of pleasure to dance across his skin. 

That maybe, even now, his chest swells with anything but hatred as he thinks back on it.

With a deep breath, he waits until Sawamatsu’s car is out of sight before he begins the journey to the bus stop. He sends Koizumi a text to tell him that the job is over, he’s left his outfit at the restaurant, he’ll come by later to drop off the information.

And he texts Shizu-chan, just in case the idiot is still awake.   
  


__ ‘I’m on my way back now. You’d better not be drooling on my pillow.’  
  


A single bed. He wonders why that seemed like such a good idea when he was booking their room.

 

* * *

 

Shizuo awakens to the sound of someone shuffling around in the bathroom. He listens to the squeak of the shower turning on, to the water spitting momentarily before drumming against the tile. His bleary gaze catches sight of an ugly jacket tossed over the back of one of the fluffy couches, the dark shoes placed on the mat by the door.

He takes in the smell of old food lingering in the room, mingling with Izaya’s familiar scent and causing a stir in his belly. Eventually, his brain pieces together these little clues — the waitress uniform, the smell of food, the early morning arrival — and he decides that there is no part of him that wants to know exactly what kind of job Koizumi had Izaya working last night.

The clock on the bedside table indicates that it’s nearly eight in the morning. Chiyo invited them to lunch at eleven, and he isn’t sure if he should remind Izaya of that or not. It would be easy enough to blame jetlag, to convince them that Izaya had caught some kind of twenty-four hour bug on their flight, but he isn’t completely convinced that the stubborn bastard would let him.

He’d compare it to dipping a bloody finger in a shark tank, or something equally dramatic and stupid, Shizuo knows. He’d keep himself awake for a month straight if that meant showing weakness to no one. 

Shizuo doesn’t understand why anyone would care so much about appearing strong. Strength, he thinks, is completely overrated. Sleep, however, is one of the few things in life that he would never want to give up. 

He sits up just as Izaya is making his way from the bathroom, dressed in his favorite pair of pajamas and working a towel through his hair. Shizuo takes a moment to appreciate the looseness of the fabric, the way that it almost seems to swallow him up, and the dazed look on Izaya’s face as he comes forward and sits on the edge of the bed.

The seconds tick by silently as they sit together. Shizuo watches the water dampening the back of Izaya’s shirt, the towel placed in his lap, the gentle expanding of his ribcage as he takes one breath after another. He notes the light playing against the paleness of Izaya’s skin, the heat-reddened tips of his ears. He wonders how much sleep Izaya is willing to lose over pride alone. 

“Lay down,” he says after many moments have passed, leaning forward to grip Izaya’s arm and tug him back, “Get some fucking sleep so you’re not a goddamn zombie at lunch later.”

Izaya turns a blurry gaze in his direction, nodding twice before climbing further onto the bed. He doesn’t pull the blankets up to cover himself. He doesn’t even turn over Shizuo’s pillow as he usually does before falling asleep on it. He plops down, closes his eyes, and passes out in record-breaking time.

And Shizuo might be laughing at him for being such an idiot, but Izaya’s phone is buzzing in his jacket pocket. When he pulls it out to make sure that it isn’t important, he wonders if Izaya thinks that he’s stupid enough to not recognize who  _ ‘Pervert’  _ could be.

He almost answers, almost tells Koizumi exactly what he thinks of the manner in which the old bastard is yanking Izaya around, but he stops himself. 

Whatever mess Izaya has gotten himself into, that might just make it worse. He turns down the volume button until it’s silent. He grabs Izaya’s towel from the floor and hangs it up in the bathroom. 

He finds a room service menu, orders breakfast, and puts the charges on Izaya’s bill. 

It’s the least the little pipsqueak can do, really. After all, he owes Shizuo a hell of a lot more than a free meal. 

 

* * *

 

_ Izaya sends a look in Tomoko’s direction, watching as the color runs hot against her cheeks, as she trains a shameful gaze on her shoes. Her apron is stained with various blotches of food. Her face is shiny with sweat, hair askew, dark bags standing out under tired eyes as Fukayama finishes his speech and descends from the stage. _

_ The room erupts in applause as Fukayama slips away within the crowd. Everything moves at half-speed, the bodies around him lurching forward, mechanic, stiff, blurry figures making useless loops about the room as he focuses his attention of the way that Tomoko wrings her hands and looks around at all of the pitying smiles. A pet project is all that they consider her, he thinks.  _

_ Despite the deliciousness of her food, they find themselves comfortably set in the belief that she is only serving at this event because of Fukayama’s charity. Maybe they’re right. Maybe she might have never gotten the business off of the ground if it hadn’t been for a rich thug advertising her name. _

_ Before he can allow himself to delve further into his thoughts, a series of explosions bellow through the air. The world around him streaks with color, the body heat of so many patrons moving around him fading to nothing but the dull warmth of hands creeping along his skin. _

_ A voice vibrates through his head, “He’s not as powerless as you think, Orihara. Even your boyfriend has weaknesses.” _

_ The shadows of touch draw over his legs, cupping at his backside, grasping at his face. _

_ Blood, so much blood, and bleary brown eyes begging him, begging _ _ — _

  
“Flea, get up, it’s time to go.”

He jolts awake quicker than he would have preferred, the crick in his neck complaining painfully as he draws in many shallow breaths and flicks his gaze about the room. Shizuo is standing over him, dressed in his usual bartender’s clothes, and for only a moment, he’s donning an ill-fitting suit, dripping with blood. 

Izaya reaches forward, pressing his fingers into Shizuo’s chest. He maps out the spots where the bullets hit, the places where faded scars still mark those ugly wounds even so many months later. His breathing evens out. His vision clears. Shizuo grasps gently at his hand. 

“Izaya,” he speaks, and there’s a jagged edge to his words, as though he understands exactly what Izaya is thinking about, “Come on. Get ready. We’re going to be late.”

Pulling himself out of bed proves to be more difficult than it should be. His limbs feel like rubber, his back cracks as he chances a stretch. His eyes feel heavy with exhaustion, and a look at the clock explains why. 

It’s twenty minutes until eleven. He’s only slept for a few hours. 

Shizuo reassures him that they can take a nap when they get back, and only the thought of curling up in bed again gives him the strength to brush his teeth, wet down his wild hair, and dress in the clothing that Shizu-chan has so kindly set out for him. 

His jacket reeks of stale food, but he dons it nonetheless. The early spring chill is enough to convince him that this is the right decision, but he’s feeling more naked than usual, and ambling about with bare arms might make him feel as though he’s wearing nothing but his underwear in the streets. He tries not to think about it. He hides his little jump as his fingers slip inside of his pocket and brush against Sawamatsu’s business card.

Shizuo eyes him for a moment before opening the door and stepping out into the hall. They don’t exchange many words, aside from the name of the restaurant, whether they want to take the bus or try to hail a cab, and Izaya takes advantage of the silence. Koizumi will be interested in getting his information as soon as possible, as long as this job is the real thing, and he’s not just throwing useless jobs at him just to piss him off.

He checks his phone, glaring tiny daggers at Shizuo’s back as he notices all of his missed calls and the volume turned all the way down. Koizumi has tried to contact him six times. He’s sent so many texts that the tiny bubble next to his name says only _“100+”_. 

Pinching the bridge of his nose, he stuffs his phone back in his pocket as Shizuo flags down a taxi. He barely remembers leaving their room, let alone stepping outside, and the prickling of cold air against his skin only reminds him of the stink of old coffee on Sawamatsu’s breath. 

He fights down a shiver, stepping forward and ducking his head as he climbs inside of the car. Shizu-chan squeezes in beside him, instructing the driver awkwardly as he shuffles about to get comfortable. He keeps sending Izaya these weird looks, as though he expects for him to keel over any second, and Izaya can’t say that he blames him. The glimpses that he’s catching of himself in the rear-view mirror are the reflection of a man who’s recently climbed out of a garbage truck. 

The girls surely won’t have the tact to keep their comments to themselves. He takes a moment to marvel at the idea that anyone could possibly be more bone-headed and absolutely terrible at picking up on cues than Heiwajima Shizuo.

He sneaks a glance in Shizuo’s direction. He’s looking out the window, head rested on a closed fist, elbow propped against the windowsill. He seems to be deep in thought, about what, Izaya has no idea. He’s never considered what protozoans might actually daydream about. More driftwood for the fire? More pliable stones for the cave drawings? He’ll have to ask when he’s alert enough to dodge a punch. He isn’t particularly interested in adding a black eye to the growing list of things wrong with his appearance today.

The restaurant draws nearer and Shizu-chan still hasn’t broken free from his thoughts. His brows are knitted, jaw tense. He seems as though he might pounce at the smallest provocation, and so, Izaya allows him to sit tight until the taxi pulls to a stop. 

He can see the girls waiting around outside, chatting away, fawning over the ring glimmering on Chiyo’s finger. He rubs his eyes. He hasn’t slept enough to deal with this, he thinks. Chiyo’s cackles carry all the way across the sidewalk through the windows. Bunko-chan turns and meets his eye as he climbs out of the cab. She flushes darkly, snapping her gaze to the ground. Tomoko turns and smiles, wider than anyone has ever smiled at him before, and he tells himself, again and again, that maybe it won’t be so bad the second time around.

At least he’s prepared now. At least Shizu-chan won’t find himself on the wrong end of any guns. 

At least it’s not as hot as yesterday, and his phone is no longer vibrating in his pocket.

 

* * *

 

Tomoko-san hugs him before he even has the chance to say hello. She’s teary-eyed, and he can’t comprehend why. Chiyo tells the two of them to get a room, but she’s yanking Izaya forward and capturing him in a one-armed hug, squeezing him so tightly that Shizuo wonders if he’ll pop.

“You look good,” Tomoko-san sighs, pulling back to hold him at arm’s length, smiling up at him despite the mascara smeared below her eyes, “Even more handsome that I remembered.”

He doesn’t get why everyone keeps telling him how good he looks now, as though they’d expected him to come back half-dead, like Izaya, maybe. Walking around like a zombie. 

He chances a glance in Izaya’s direction, and Chiyo is commenting on the dark circles under his eyes. She’s asking him how much sleep he’s getting, if maybe he should think about turning off each of his phones — even the important ones — in order to get a good night’s sleep. Shizuo feels like that might be asking a little much, and Izaya seems to quietly agree. He’s nodding as though he’s being lectured by his mother, the mask of a smirk slowly sliding over his lips, until there is no true emotion seeping through the cracks anymore.

Before they cause too much of a scene, Kyou-san reminds them that they have reservations, ushering them inside. He sends Bunko-san a nod in greeting, but she won’t quite meet his eyes. It’s troubling, but he tries not to think about it too much. He can’t remember why he feels so awkward around her, or if he really should at all. He can barely remember anything from their trip last year aside from Izaya looking up at him in that pool in the middle of the night, Koizumi’s shit-eating grin, the way that Tomoko-san had held him at the bar, and waking up in the hospital. 

Everything else, he decides, must not have been that important.

They’re lead to a table near the back of the restaurant. It’s a quaint diner, maybe a little nicer than the sorts of places where he and Tom-san stop for lunch each day. It seems like the sort of place that these girls might eat at often, might stop in for lunch after shopping or seeing a movie, and he feels a little out of place mingling with them in their own familiar territory. 

Izaya follows wordlessly. There’s a slump in his shoulders, his hair is a mess, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He slides into his seat and rests his head against his hand, not even looking up as Shizuo shuffles in just a little too close beside him.

The tables are small with lacy tablecloth. The menus are cute, he thinks — scrawled in loopy font that he has to squint to decipher. This isn’t the sort of place that he or Izaya frequently visit. Izaya prefers fancy restaurants, the sorts with a separate wine menu. He likes to exercise his wit with the waiter, ordering complicated dishes that Shizuo thinks might be in an entirely different language. He can never seem to keep up. A cute cafe like this, with each entree nicknamed with a pun, it’s definitely not the sort of place that he could imagine either of them stopping in at for a meal. 

However, Tomoko-san and the girls seem quite at home here. He wonders if he could begin to feel that way too.

Izaya says that he isn’t hungry when the waitress makes her way to their table. He orders a large coffee, and he doesn’t even waste the energy arguing when Tomoko-san objects.

She’s fiddling with her napkin nervously, looking between the two of them like there’s something that she wants to say, but she can’t quite find the words. He bites back the urge to tell her to just spit it out, to rattle the table a little and inform her just how much he hates it when people won’t say what’s on their mind. But he knows Tomoko-san. He knows that she’s worried. Chiyo’s probably told her all about her phone call with Izaya last night, even though  _ he _ still isn’t entirely sure what the Hell they talked about. Something that she’d said had caused Izaya to snuggle up with him though. Somewhere between the snotty rebuttals and the fake jokes, Izaya had resolved to put all of their problems aside. He can’t complain, really, but he feels as though she might know something that neither of them are quite aware of yet.

That seems to be a common theme among them, at least. Each of the girls were able to sense the tension between them from the moment that they’d stepped into the catering company on the very first day. A decade together, he thinks, fighting and chasing and attempting murder, and he’d never imagined that Izaya could have been hiding anything from him aside from a knife in a secret pocket. He never could have comprehended that they’d be sitting together without trying to strangle each other at all, let alone on a lunch date with three people who they’d fooled for an entire month. 

Life is unexpected, he thinks. There are surprises around every corner. This seems to be the sort of thing that Izaya would tell him after coming home late. The sort of thing that he’d say with such a casual smile that Shizuo would be tempted to punch him until he started talking like a normal person.

With a sigh, he orders the first thing that catches his eye. Some sort of thin pancake. “Crepe Sera-Sera”, is the pun, and he doesn’t understand that either. Izaya snorts as he reads it awkwardly off of the menu, and even the waitress has to stifle a giggle.

He isn’t sure where to look after that — at Chiyo’s pink cheeks as she holds back her laughter, at Tomoko-san’s soft eyes despite her frazzled twitching, at Kyou-san who seems to be ravenous with hunger, sizing up a man eating two tables away, or at Bunko-san who still won’t meet his eyes. Or maybe at Izaya, forehead pressed against the table, possibly dead, possibly reconsidering his decision to return to Aomori now that he’s remembered who exactly resides here.

His chest twinges at the mere thought of it. Koizumi’s smug smile. Those disgusting text messages, a bouquet of flowers with a dirty note scrawled on the card. Izaya’s ridiculous outfits and the way that he’d burned with anger when he’d stepped into the apartment in that — that —

_ Outfit.  _

He shakes his head to rid himself of those thoughts. With so many people around, it wouldn’t be appropriate to drag Izaya into the bathroom and relive those old memories. Maybe later, he tells himself. Maybe after he forces Izaya to get some sleep. 

Chiyo is talking about flowers. She’s telling them about her parents and her fiance’s parents arguing over which flowers to use in the ceremony, and Shizuo finds himself contemplating if marriage is really worth the headache. He knows of roses and tulips, maybe two or three more, but he didn’t know that baby’s breath was even a type of flower, and he’s not sure if he’d want something with such a gross name in his wedding anyway.

The girls are laughing at one of Chiyo’s jokes, and even Izaya has raised himself up to half-heartedly join the conversation. Shizuo finds himself smiling, laughing at particularly funny lines. He catches himself feeling those old feelings again — like he’s found his second home. Like things might be okay for a while.

And the bell at the entrance rings. He turns his head, catches the dark eyes of a man who he hoped to never see again.

A smug smile, broad shoulders lifting and falling in a casual shrug, a half-assed greeting. 

His eyes widen, his pulse pounds in his ears.

Koizumi waves, nearing their table right as Izaya finally registers his presence and scoots far back in his seat.

It’s nearly noon, and Shizuo decides that even this home comes with its own set of problems.  
  
Namely, whether or not it would be appropriate to punch someone in the middle of a busy diner. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry that I didn't post anything last week! I had a funeral to attend, and I decided to give myself a week off to sort of gather my thoughts. I wanted this chapter to be a lot more light-hearted, and I definitely couldn't have pulled that off at that time! I might have also promised that it would be longer, but then I wanted a cliff-hanger, sort of, so... we're left with this. I'll try to make the next few chapters a little longer to make up for it. Maybe an extra thousand words here and there, then... we'll be back on track. 
> 
> I think I might have also forgotten to announce the Wednesday posting schedule, which will be the norm until further notice. 
> 
> Anyway, Koizumi returns--Again! He really needs to learn when it's appropriate to make an entrance. And Sawamatsu? Better or worse or maybe the same as Fukayama? Only time can tell. Haha!
> 
> Thank you so much for being so patient with me! This chapter was a lot of fun! I hope you guys liked it!


	4. Incendiary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Many helpless flies, all tangled in a single spider's web.

Kyou-chan rises before anyone else can make a move. She lets out an excited squeal. While Izaya’s exhausted brain is having trouble piecing together what exactly is going on, he can’t help but notice the pained grimace that flickers across Tomoko’s face before she forcefully replaces it with an awkward smile.

“Yoshi-kun, you came!”

He falters, taking another look at Koizumi’s broad grin as Kyou-chan runs to greet him. It is...  _ Koizumi _ , right? His doppleganger isn’t roving through the very same city, coming frightfully close to ending the very universe upon their first meeting? There can’t be too many men with the same monstrous figure, the same sneaky, dark gaze. The same leathery skin and bright, pointed canines. 

But “Yoshi-kun” is not a nickname that sounds anything like Koizumi. As he’s mulling over these details, their new guest comes to pull a chair toward their table, shuffling in between to Kyou-san and Shizuo and grinning as though half of the group wouldn’t want anything more than to embed a butter knife into his skull. 

“Yoshi-kun, huh?” Izaya finds himself questioning, so lost in his thoughts that he barely catches that the words are leaving him.

Koizumi twitches. Shizu-chan stiffens in his seat, glaring so hard at the table that his anger alone might shatter it into pieces.

“Koizumi Hideyoshi,” Koizumi affirms, cocking his head to the side as he places a finger against the corner of a menu, dragging it across the table toward him, “I would have thought that such a  _ skilled informant  _ could have easily managed to dig up that information.”

“I’m not interested in you,” Izaya spits, surprising everyone, even himself, with the sharp edges of his words, “It would be a waste of my time.”

Koizumi bellows a laugh. It’s a boisterous, unattractive show. A power-play, Izaya thinks. He might be pretending that tucking himself in next to Heiwajima Shizuo is no big feat, but even Izaya can see the way that he shirks away. He notices every uncomfortable twitch when Shizuo almost looks at him, when their arms come close to brushing against each other.

“You seem a little grumpy today, Orihara-san. Maybe you should try to get more sleep.”

It’s Shizuo who reacts to that. He slams his fist so hard against the table that the napkin container falls over, the salt and pepper shakers spilling over the pile of menus.

Koizumi jumps from his seat so quickly that Izaya’s eyes almost don’t catch it. He’s standing three steps back, shaking slightly, hands raised in front of him in a defensive show. 

Shizuo looks more startled by his outburst than anyone else. He clears his throat, setting everything back in place and brushing the salt and pepper mixture into a clean pile. He doesn’t look up from the table, a soft flush burning against the apples of his cheeks.

“Sorry,” he mutters, and Izaya isn’t entirely sure who he’s apologizing to.

Chiyo snickers as Koizumi stiffly reseats himself. Kyou-chan sends a stern look in Shizuo’s direction. Bunko-chan seems to be trying her hardest to ignore all of them, and he doesn’t have to be fully coherent to understand why. She’s still sore, he supposes, about Shizu-chan stealing him away. She doesn’t understand how easily he could have chewed up and spit out a silly girl like her, how big of a favor Shizu-chan really did for her.

With a shrug, he turns his attention back to Kyou-chan and Koizumi. 

“He hasn’t offed you yet,” he draws out lazily, dragging his finger through the pile of salt and pepper, “This must be a record-breaking relationship for you, right, Yoshi-kun?”

Koizumi’s following laughter is a bit more strained. Kyou-chan looks confused, but she seems to decide that she’ll ask questions later. Shizuo has sneaked a hand against Izaya’s knee under the table, squeezing gently, reassuring him of something despite Izaya’s iron-clad, casual mask. 

“Yoshi-kun and I are in an open relationship,” Kyou-chan announces, ignoring the way that Shizuo sputters and the horrified, wide-eyed gape that he’s unable to conceal, “There’s me, Gege-chan, and Ao-chan. Today is my day with darling Yoshi-kun, so of course he needed to come along!” 

Izaya feels bile rising in his throat. When the waitress brings his coffee, he can’t even force himself to drink it anymore. Even with Tomoko’s pestering, he finds himself only staring at his tired reflection in the cup, wishing that he could have just sat this one out and allowed Shizu-chan to run wild. Maybe he would have strangled Koizumi if Izaya weren’t here. Maybe he would have killed him.

With a heavy sigh, he drags his gaze along the table. Chiyo is asking Shizuo a series of questions about their relationship. Tomoko is joining in at random intervals, smiling like a mother watching her child walk for the very first time. Bunko-chan is texting under the table, barely picking at her food. Kyou-chan and Koizumi are engaging a disgustingly domestic conversation that he wants no part of.

A startling question drags him out of his thoughts. His heartbeat quickens, a cold sweat gathering at his hairline as the words leave Chiyo’s mouth. 

Of course, he thinks. Nothing can ever be easy. Nothing can ever go his way. Chiyo will always ask the very worst thing, and stupid, pea-brained Shizu-chan will always be stupid enough to answer honestly.

“So have you guys moved in together yet?”

Shizu-chan coughs, even more color rising to his cheeks. He takes a bite of his crepe, bashful as he chews. Seeming to draw out the action if only to postpone his reply.

“Well, uh,” he falters, turning to send Izaya a quick, nervous glance, “Izaya doesn’t think that it’s a good idea.”

Izaya thinks that he might not sleep for the next five thousand years. If he does finally lie down, it will be in a prison bed, maximum security, solitary confinement in a padded room. He’ll live the rest of his days rotting away in a cell for murdering Heiwajima Shizuo. 

_ “He’s a monster,”  _ will be his defense,  _ “And he can’t keep his idiotic mouth shut.” _

Tomoko lets out a low hum, but the smile drawing out along Chiyo’s lips…

_ It’s predatory. _

Izaya swallows hard.

This won’t end well, he just knows it.

 

* * *

 

When they make it back to the hotel room, Izaya doesn’t get much sleep at all. 

Shizuo steps into the room, untying his bowtie and shrugging off his vest. He hangs these neatly on one of the hotel hangers, wondering if it’s too early in the day to change back into his pajamas. Before he can contemplate this further, Izaya is pushing him back onto the bed.

He’s surprised more than overpowered, but he lets it happen. He closes his eyes on impact, openingly them to the sight of Izaya crawling on top of him, a deep shadow hanging over his eyes. His lips are a firm line, a jagged smile, and there’s something in the way that he trembles that tells Shizuo just how much trouble he’s in.

“Why,” Izaya hisses, purposefully grinding his hips into Shizuo’s groin, dragging a hand up to tangle in blond hair, “ _ Why _ would you tell them that I don’t want to move in with you?”

Shizuo can’t find the strength to speak. His words lodge in a thick lump in his throat. His erratic heartbeat thumps so loudly that he can’t barely hear anything else.

“I—”

“Are you so dimwitted that you’ve never told a lie in your life?”

He almost says yes, he hates liars. But Izaya doesn’t look like he wants an answer. In this moment, ragged and enraged, he reminds Shizuo of that night in front of the hotel; when they kissed, when Izaya sliced open his hand and barreled away like some sort of temperamental cat. He’s frazzled and stressed out, he’s exhausted and embarrassed. Shizuo wouldn’t say that he loves seeing him like this, but in this moment, Izaya might be beautiful. 

In many moments, he tells himself, Izaya is beautiful. And maybe this moment is simply no exception.

“You really don’t understand anything, do you, Shizu-chan?” Izaya’s voice is softer this time. He’s dragging a hand over Shizuo’s belly, tugging his shirt free from his pants as his eyes burn holes against Shizuo’s skin.

There’s a hardness pressing against Shizuo that he can’t bring himself to address. There’s tightness in his own pants, a quickening of his pulse, a warmth that spreads out over his skin as all of the blood in his body rushes to a single place. 

It’s been a while, he realizes. It’s been almost a week since anyone has touched him like this.

Maybe it’s a little strange to consider a week to be a long time. Maybe Izaya has been spoiling him until this point, but he can’t concentrate on that train of thought right now. He can’t do much of anything but stare, wide-eyed, as Izaya leans forward and plants a gentle kiss against his lips.

“Shizu-chan can’t understand why that’s such a bad idea,” he murmurs, rocking his hips slowly, forward and back, “What a hopeless romantic.”

Shizuo wouldn’t consider himself much of a romantic, but he doesn’t argue. He bites back a moan as Izaya continues to grind against him, leaning forward to press their lips together once more.

Izaya sits straighter, pulling off his jacket and tossing it haphazardly on the floor. He unbuttons the front of Shizuo’s shirt, peeling it open. He rests a hand just high enough above the erection straining in Shizuo’s pants that it’s noticeable, peppering his chest with soft kisses. His movements are slow, painstakingly so, and Shizuo wonders if this is a form of punishment. He wonders if he should be feeling guilty for telling Tomoko-san and the other girls about how Izaya has adamantly refused to talk about moving in together.

Izaya flicks his gaze upward, burning Shizuo to the core as he pokes out a wet tongue and draws it downward. He slides back until he’s only leaning on the bed, crouched between Shizuo’s legs. He fumbles with the buckle of Shizuo’s belt.

Shizuo allows his head to fall back. He works out patterns on the ceiling as Izaya unzips his fly and tugs his erection out of his pants. His pulse spikes as hot breath hits the head, as a wet mouth slowly, torturously envelops him. 

His fists tangle in the sheets. He spreads his legs as Izaya works his head up and down, pumping at the shaft each time that his lips pull back, so much better than the first time, so much more talented after a year of practice.

Shizuo isn’t entirely sure what he’s done to deserve this. He doesn’t know why Izaya has chosen to assault him now, but he doesn’t question it. He can feel the pressure of his orgasm building in his abdomen. He can feel himself, wracked with shivers, coming closer and closer to finishing.

Izaya doesn’t pull away at the last second, like he might have expected. He doesn’t swallow, he never does, and he doesn’t complain when Shizuo looks to him and notices, in horror, the mess has dribbled along his lips and chin. 

He rises, spitting in the trash can and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He’s still hard, but he makes his way to the bathroom, closing the door and clicking the lock. 

Shizuo watches the door for a long time. He listens as his pulse slows, regains his bearings, calms his breathing. 

And he thinks about the look in Izaya’s eyes: guarded, hungry, tired.

He doesn’t know what the hell is happening, but Izaya isn’t going out again tonight. He won’t let him. He’ll hold him down and force him to sleep if he has to. 

With a long sigh, he pulls himself up, pacing the room for a few minutes before grabbing the room service menu and flipping through it. He might text Celty and ask for advice, but her relationship with Shinra is just as abnormal as theirs. 

Maybe he’ll call Tom-san. Maybe he’ll call Tomoko-san. 

This might be normal, he tells himself. Maybe Izaya isn’t getting cold feet. Maybe there are no Yakuza bosses pulling his strings, but Izaya sure as Hell will never tell him anything.

He needs to get to the bottom of this, he tells himself. No matter what, he’s not going to allow Izaya to shoulder this alone.

On a whim, he searches the pockets of Izaya’s jacket. He was hoping for a phone, but a single, unassuming business card is all that he finds.

_ ‘Dragon’s Den: Ignite the Fires of your Passions’ _ With a number scrawled over the address, and a  name—Sawamatsu Hayato—which is unfamiliar. It could be anyone. It could be no one of any importance at all. Nothing is making any sense, but that’s normal with Izaya, he thinks.

He doesn’t hear the shower running, so he isn’t entirely sure what Izaya is up to in the bathroom. It’s been ten minutes of silence. No hushed voice on the other side of the door, no clambering or snoring. No running sink or any hints as to what Izaya might have locked himself away for.

Shizuo considers for a moment that Izaya might be relieving himself, but the idea causes such an overbearing heat to sweep over his skin that he squashes it immediately. Instead of waiting around, he decides to knock on the door.

There’s no reply.

Two more knocks, and still nothing. Not so much as the sound of Izaya'a labored breathing.

He tells himself that Izaya can easily afford to replace a lousy doorknob as he breaks it loose and pushes his way through. Izaya was so exhausted earlier that part of him worries that the idiot might have passed out in the middle of going to the bathroom. Maybe he’d hit his head. Maybe he’d—

The door swings open, and it takes three sweeps of the room to notice the open window, curtains wafting slowly as a breeze rolls in from outside.

Izaya is nowhere to be found. The window is just big enough that a scrawny louse might be able to squeeze through.

No note, no text. Izaya has disappeared. Again. 

Shizuo sits on the closed lid of the toilet and runs a nervous hand through his hair.

He doesn’t understand what the Hell is going on, but he needs to get to the bottom of it.

Whether Izaya wants him to or not.

 

* * *

 

Without his jacket, Izaya feels just exposed as he would have expected. He hails a cab, smiling as the driver asks him where his coat is on such a chilly day, and directs him to Koizumi’s building. His head is throbbing, bags heavy beneath glassy eyes as he rubs the tension from his brow. The sooner he gets this over with, the sooner he can head back to the apartment and pretend that none of this ever happened.

He isn’t sure how long the locked bathroom door will keep Shizuo at bay. He’d considered running the shower, but he knows that Shizuo would have lectured him about it if he’d broken in anyway. His orgasm had bought Izaya some time. It’s been a long time since he’s touched the brute, so he’s sure that he’d lazed around for awhile before even considering how strange it was for Izaya to lock himself away with no real reason to be in the bathroom at all.

Shaking his head, he decides that he’ll cross that bridge when he gets there. Climbing through the window has left scratches on his hands and belly. He’s bruised in places that he’s never been bruised before. He’s exhausted and frustrated, and he’s definitely not looking forward to scaling the side of the building and shimmying back in through such a tiny opening. He only hopes that Shizu-chan decided to take a nap, that the window will still be open when he returns, and the two of them can sleep together for the first time in a long time without any further interruptions. 

When he finally manages to shake himself from his thoughts, the driver is pulling to a stop in front of Koizumi’s building. He waves a short goodbye after paying the guy, fabricating a hop in his step as he makes his way from the sidewalk to the wide glass doors. The doormen recognize him by now. He hates even wondering what they might think of him, who they might consider him to be to Koizumi. 

The elevator ride is so much quicker than he thinks that it should be. He’s stepping in, then immediately stepping out. He remembers this ride taking centuries longer the very first time, when he’d dreaded spending even a second in Shizu-chan’s company.

Now, he muses, a wry smile cracking out over his lips, he wants nothing more than to return to the hotel and spend the rest of the night with him. Time, he decides, is an unusual God. It molds people and changes things, until even the impossible can seem completely commonplace. Like Heiwajima Shizuo and Orihara Izaya getting along. Like Izaya wanting nothing more than to fall asleep in the moronic monster’s arms.

Koizumi is facing the door as he steps into the room, slouched comfortably on the curved couch with his back to the television. The news is muted in the background, but Izaya makes out the mugshot of some random thugs who were arrested for God-knows-what earlier in the morning. He flicks his gaze from the program to Koizumi’s sultry smile. He tries to ignore the tingling of cockroach’s feet dragging along the insides of his skin. He tries to pretend that even looking at Koizumi doesn’t make him feel absolutely disgusting.

“That didn’t take too long,” Koizumi greets, drumming his fingers in slow rhythm against the back of the couch, “Shizu-chan let you go so easily?”

Izaya moves further into the room, stopping only a few steps away from the circle of couches. He plucks his phone from his pocket, scrolling through the contacts to find Sawamatsu’s number saved near the bottom.

“I can’t imagine why that would be any of your concern,” He replies curtly.

Koizumi laughs, just as open and loud as he had earlier at the restaurant. Izaya can envision him sitting with Kyou-chan and a few other women tucked under each meaty arm. He imagines the sound of their girlish giggles drowned out by the tidal wave of that laugh. 

“Don’t be so cold, Iza-chan,” Koizumi says, a sudden sharpness cutting away at the mirth in his eyes, “It’s unbecoming, wouldn’t you say? Or does Shizu-chan get off on that coldness?”

Izaya hits the button to open Sawamatsu’s contact page a little too roughly. The imprint of his finger lingers on the screen for a few seconds before fading away.

“Do you sexually harass all of your employees,  _ Yoshi-kun _ ?” He questions, rounding the couches until he reaches the opening between them and slides in, “Do you ask the doormen about their fetishes when they greet you every morning?”

Koizumi’s resounding laughter is no less loud, but noticeably more strained. He picks up on that crack in the older man’s armor, wonders if he might be able to whither away at that single chink until he can find a real weakness. Koizumi seems to sense what he’s thinking, because he clears his throat then, crossing one leg over the other as his expression slips easily from easy-going to absolute seriousness.

“So you’ve collected information on Sawamatsu then?” 

Izaya slides his phones across the coffee table, stone-faced as Koizumi programs the number into his own phone.

“He gave me his business card as well, but I’ll have to give that to you at a later date,” Izaya sighs, sitting just a little straighter in his seat, “If you’re interested in receiving complete reports, you should try not to contact me so short-notice.”

Koizumi looks at him for what feels like hours. His slitted eyes sparkle with something that Izaya refuses to address, a knowing smirk cracking the corners of his lips as he slides the phone back across the table.

“Let me guess, you had to trick the monster in order to sneak away?” His question clenches anxiety in the depths of Izaya’s belly, and he can’t understand why. These probing questions are really nothing new, “Did you crawl out of the window while his back was turned?”

Izaya might have twitched, or maybe his breath caught just right in his throat, because Koizumi’s smile only broadens.

“Who would have thought that Orihara Izaya would allow himself to be kept on such a short leash.”

His skin prickles, pocketknife feeling heavier and rougher than ever before against his thigh. His fingers itch to reach for it. His mind reels with so many different thoughts of the many different ways that he might disembowel the old bastard if only his body could be quick enough to allow it.

“Sawamatsu seems to have a taste for men dressed as women,” Izaya speaks, eager to change the subject if only so his sleep-muddled thoughts don’t make any decisions that he’ll later regret, “You picked me specifically because of this, correct?”

Koizumi doesn’t laugh this time, but Izaya can sense the amusement emanating off of him. He grits his teeth, pocketing his phone hastily and rising to leave.

“If that’s all that you needed, I’m leaving.”

Koizumi doesn’t stop him, doesn’t throw any final jeers at his receding back, doesn’t reach out a hand and grasp his wrist.

As the elevator doors slide open and Izaya takes a step inside, he finally calls out. It’s a simple sentence, one that he’s spoken time and time again to many different clients, but the words have never crawled so ominously over his own skin.

“I’ll be in contact.”

He waits until the elevator reaches ground floor before he finally allows himself to shiver.

 

* * *

 

_ “Shizuo-senpai must eradicate the boss,” _ Vorona’s voice buzzes through the receiver, monotoned and humorless as he’s come to expect,  _ “Eradicate the boss, and tick boyfriend will not have further troubles.” _

He can hear Tom-san’s nervous laughter as he seemingly reaches forward and takes his phone away from her. The line hisses as it changes hands. He can hear bustling in the background, and he wonders if they’re eating lunch at the usual fast food place, or if they’ve decided to treat themselves to Russia Sushi for the day.

_ “Please don’t kill the guy, Shizuo,” _ Tom chides, amusement tinged with fear,  _ “I know that Izaya guy isn’t very good at  _ not _ talking out of his ass, but maybe you should confront him?” _

_ “—Eradicate the pest boyfriend and Shizuo-senpai will no longer have to worry about potential criminal activity.” _

Tom-san tells Vorona to stop talking about murder in public, reassuring her that killing Izaya won’t solve as many of Shizuo’s problems as it will cause, and resumes talking as though there isn’t a dangerous assassin proposing the “eradication” of multiple people sitting next to him. 

_ “I think you might be right,” _ he says,  _ “I think he might be in over his head. He deals with a lot of unsavory people in his line of work, and if someone happened to find out about the two of you and tried to use that against him… If they were the right kind of person, he might take it seriously.” _

Shizuo snorts, despite the discomfort growing only stronger within his heart. Could Izaya be in trouble with the Yakuza? Why would he assume that Shizuo couldn’t take care of himself? He’s questioning this, and Tom-san must sense it. Really, Shizuo thinks that he would have made a better therapist than a debt collector, or maybe even a psychic. He reads people all-too well. 

Or maybe Shizuo is just easier to read than most people.

_ “You said that he still makes a big deal out of you getting shot last year, right?” _

Shizuo nods, and despite Tom-san not being able to see his face, he seems to sense that Shizuo has done so. He must be used to Shizuo’s awkwardness by now. He understands that he’ll never quite grasp the proper etiquette that one must use while talking on the phone.

_ “Well, it seems like he’s thinking that you’re not as indestructible as he originally thought,” _ Tom-san muses, and Shizuo can imagine him scratching idly at his chin in thought,  _ “You need to remind him that you survived that, and you’ll probably survive a lot of things. Even though a bullet wound might slow you down, it’s never stopped you.” _

There’s a long pause, then:

_ “But you should really be more careful. Just because you’ve survived it twice now, that doesn’t mean that you’re actually indestructible.”  _

Letting out a soft hum, he nods again. Tom-san worries too much, he thinks. It’s not like there’s any danger involved in their visit this time around. A wedding might be a headache, but it’s not like anyone will be pointing any guns at him. The only thing that he has to fear, really, is losing his cool and going through with his threat to strangle Koizumi.

And while he would like to tell himself that it’s very unlikely to happen, he can’t help but grumble a bit at the memory of the old bastard telling Izaya to get more sleep. That nerve alone, he muses, deserves a nice, firm punch in the face.

“That’s not going to happen again,” he replies after some time has passed, “It’s not like everyone around here has guns, Tom-san. I don’t even know if his bastard boss has a gun.”

_ “I would assume that he would,”  _ Tom-san interjects, strained as Vorona seems to be fighting him for the phone,  _ “He’s a bigshot in the Yakuza there, right?” _

Nodding again, Shizuo throws himself down on the chair by the window, sighing softly as the fur of Izaya’s jacket tickles the back of his neck. 

“I could always punch him,” He says, resting his head against Izaya’s jacket and staring lazily up at the ceiling, “I don’t think it would ruin Chiyo’s wedding. She’d probably laugh her ass off.”

Vorona seems to think that this is a good idea, but Tom-san shoots it down. He tells Shizuo that punching a member of the Yakuza probably isn’t a good idea, regardless of how far away he lives. They have connections, he says. Even so far away, he might be able to enact his revenge.

“I warned him though. I told him not to fuck with Izaya or I’d hurt him. And he’s still fucking with Izaya, so he shouldn’t be surprised when I punch him.”

Tom-san’s chuckle sounds choked. Vorona is telling him to punch Koizumi in the throat. She tells him,  _ “Groin first to incapacitate the target, then punch in throat.” _

They have to return to work soon after, but Tom-san tells him to be careful. There’s an edge to his warning that doesn’t sit well with Shizuo, but he can’t find the right words to describe it. He can barely bring himself to say goodbye.

_ “Talk to him, Shizuo,”  _ Tom-san tells him,  _ “If talking doesn’t work, then maybe you should try to figure out what’s going on yourself.” _

With that, the line dies. Vorona’s squabbling is cut short, and he has a feeling that hanging up was an accident as they wrestled for the phone.

Oh well, he thinks. They have a job to do anyway. He shouldn’t have bugged them in the middle of a shift with his problems. He should have allowed them to enjoy their lunch in peace.

Just as he’s resigning himself to another lonely night, the lock clicks. He watches as the knob turns in slow-motion, heartbeat thudding in his ears as the door swings open and Izaya pads into the room.

Their eyes meet. Izaya frowns. 

“You locked the window,” he greets. Shizuo nods.

“You shouldn’t have been climbing out of it anyway.”

With a click of his tongue, Izaya closes the door behind him. He pulls out the contents of his pockets, emptying the room keys and a myriad of different knives on the TV stand. His phone is still in his pocket, Shizuo can see the bulge of it. He wonders why Izaya always keeps such a close eye on it, as though Shizuo could crack the passcode anyway.

“I had business to attend to,” Izaya tells him, “I knew that you wouldn’t let me leave, so of course I had to slip away.”

Shizuo snorts, pushing himself up from the chair and making his way to the bed. He’s still wearing his dress shirt and pants. He couldn’t concentrate on changing after discovering that Izaya had disappeared. He’d barely been able to focus long enough to dial Tom-san’s phone number. 

“Maybe if you’d tell me what the Hell was going on, I would let you leave.”

Izaya huffs, stepping forward and sitting next to Shizuo on the bed. He stares at his hands for a while, pushing one of his rings around on his finger with his thumb. He seems to be contemplating something, so many words so obviously stuck right on the tip of his tongue.

“Koizumi has requested my services for another job,” he speaks finally, still not raising his eyes from his lap, “It’s not dangerous. Nothing that Shizu-chan needs to worry about.”

They’re quiet for a long time. Shizuo stares at their reflection in the television screen, warped and black, their faces blurry and obscured. Izaya looks small sitting next to him. Hunched and miserable, even in the unfocused reflection, he can tell how tired he is.

“Go to sleep,” he breathes, running a hand over his face and counting backwards slowly in his head, “Get some fucking rest for once, okay?”

He thinks about what Tom-san told him, but Tom-san doesn’t understand how exhausted Izaya is. He can’t comprehend what a bad idea it would be to push him right now, when he’s barely able to keep himself upright as it is.

Izaya looks up at him, surprise hinting at the corners of his frown, the slight rise of a single brow.

“You’re not going to harass me?” he questions, and Shizuo can hear the relief in his voice, the disbelief that hurts a little too much to hear, “You’re just going to let it go?”

He stands slowly, dragging a hand through his hair.

“For now, yeah,” he sighs, “You need to sleep.”

Izaya doesn’t question it further. He pulls himself into bed, kicks off his shoes after marveling momentarily at the idea that he’d forgotten to take them off at the door. And he falls asleep quickly, not even taking the time to change into his pajamas. 

Shizuo watches him for a while. He thinks about Tom-san’s warnings, about the way that Koizumi-san had sprung from the table in fear of his outburst. He thinks about the Yakuza boss who Izaya does business with back home, what sort of trouble he might have gotten himself tangled in.

He thinks about these things for a long time. His mind is jittery with nerves. He grabs Izaya’s room key from the TV stand and makes his way outside for a smoke.

When his thoughts become a jumble of too many different situations and outcomes for him to focus anymore, he tugs his phone from his pocket.

And he calls Tomoko-san.

* * *

  
  


The restaurant is flourishing with life.

Tomoko smiles as different patrons pass, as a child two tables away giggles in her direction. As the waitstaff winds through the maze tables and refill various drinks. Shizuo-kun twitches nervously, fingers hinting at the lip of his glass as he watches the scenes unfolding around them with anxious eyes.

“I’m so happy that you called,” she speaks, feeling like a broken record as she pushes her food around on her plate, “I was hoping that we’d have a chance to reconnect before you guys went back home.”

Shizuo-kun nods silently, glowering down at his own meal. She knows that something is wrong, but she can’t bring herself to ask outright. The last time that she saw him, he was stumbling toward his flight back home, paler than any healthy person should be, somehow finding the strength to walk forward despite the gunshot wounds that might have killed a weaker man.

She doesn’t understand Heiwajima Shizuo entirely. She can’t piece together where Hayashi-kun ends and the real man begins, which parts of his personality might be the same, which things he might have omitted during his month-long stay in her life.

Maki-kun was more deceptive, she understands. Orihara Izaya makes a living with his lies, but someone like Shizuo-kun… She isn’t entirely sure how genuine he’d allowed himself to be.

“Izaya’s working for that bastard Koizumi again,” he says, and she wonders if things are always so easy with him, or if maybe he just trusts her enough to be forward like this, “He won’t tell me what’s going on. He’s always keeping secrets.”

She hums apologetically. Resting her head in her hand, she reaches the other across the table, setting it on top of his. He flinches at the contact, but he doesn’t pull away. She wonders why  Heiwajima Shizuo has learned to be weary of the touch of other people. The thought alone sends small pinpricks of hurt through her chest.

“He worries about you,” she replies, searching within herself for the answers that she knows that he’s looking for, “Maybe even more than you worry about him. He tries to hide it, but I can tell.”

He makes a face at the words. He doesn’t seem to believe that anyone can worry about someone as much as he worries about Izaya-kun.

She tightens her grip on his hand, struggling to ignore the way that he jerks. She doesn’t want to think about anyone being cruel to Shizuo-kun. She doesn’t want to think of him learning to be leery of these little touches.

“Something’s going on,” he tells her, “He won’t tell me anything. He’s not sleeping. He’s hiding something.”

She tries to wrap her head around the dynamics of their relationship. Chiyo-san thinks that they’re cute together. She seems to think that their problems are normal, that they’ll find their way with time, and maybe she’s right. Their relationship seems complicated to everyone on the outside, their lives are far more bizarre than anything that Tomoko can even comprehend, but Chiyo has a way of reading people. 

If she thinks that everything will be okay, then maybe it will. 

“I can ask Kyou-san if she knows anything,” she suggests, drawing her hand away once Shizuo-kun stiffens, “Koizumi-san doesn’t talk about business much, but she’s told me that he talks about Izaya-kun a lot. He might have let something slip.”

Shizuo-kun growls at the mention of Koizumi-san, or maybe at the mention of Koizumi-san talking about Izaya. She doesn’t have a lot of love in her heart for Koizumi-san either. His blatant disregard for the well-being of others and his outright refusal to settle down with one woman paints a picture of an irresponsible, careless man. Sweet, reliable Kyou-san definitely deserves much better than that.

Shizuo-kun raises his gaze then, looking her in the eyes for the first time since they sat down nearly twenty minutes ago. He presses his fork into the cake on his plate, smearing the icing around as his frown creases and his shoulders rise. 

She can imagine him standing tall in a city far busier than this. She can envision his head bobbing above those of everyone around him—a handsome idol standing out in the crowd, a face which demands the stairs of everyone who he passes.

“I’m going to kill him,” he says simply, and she isn’t certain that this is an empty threat, “If he keeps fucking with us, I’m going to snap his goddamn neck.”

With a nervous rattle of breath, she directs her attention to the mess that she’s making on her own plate. She mulls over her options for a moment, thoughts racing with the mere idea of Shizuo-kun hurting anyone. 

“Please don’t hurt him,” she says quietly, but she can tell by the way that his shoulders slack that he hears her.

“I’ll help you.”

He looks to her, surprised. The noise around them seems to fade to a mere vibration. Her heart flutters in her chest.

“I won’t let you hurt him,” she continues, “But I’ll help you save Izaya-kun.”

She isn’t sure how she’ll do it, but she owes it to both of them. 

She’ll enlist the help of Chiyo. She’ll tire every resource that she knows. 

And by the end of their trip, she promises herself, Koizumi-san will never be able to hurt either of them again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it's almost 5AM where I am right now, but I have to work most of the day tomorrow, so I figured that I would edit this and post it early so that you guys wouldn't have to wait. No one can ever accuse me of not being dedicated! I'll tell you that much. 
> 
> Anyway, Tomoko vs. Koizumi? Who's placing bets? I can't tell you who my money's on for fear of spoiling anything, but let me tell you... (I have no idea)
> 
> A special thanks to tumblr user frankenfishen for helping me select Koizumi's first name! I really like "Yoshi-kun". Such a cute name for such a big dude. 
> 
> Thanks so much for reading! I hope this chapter isn't too weird. There's so much focus on just these first two days of their trip that I really have no clue how long it's going to get. I had seven chapters planned originally, but oh man, I have a feeling that I'm going to surprise myself again. See you guys next week!


	5. Serendipity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blessings may come in strange disguises.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As per request, I would like to warn readers that this chapter contains what could be viewed as implied dubious consent. In order to not spoil further chapters or add any inaccurate tags to this story, I will put this here and only here, but please be aware of this when reading.

“Isn’t this the sort of thing that you should be doing with your fiancé?” Izaya questions, one brow cocked as he raises the fork to his mouth, “Or do you make a habit of inviting strange men to help you make important wedding decisions?”

Chiyo’s chortle is anything but ladylike. Random patrons turn to glare in her direction.

“He’s so sick of the wedding planning,” she replies, letting out a rather inappropriate hum of pleasure as she stuffs her own forkful of food into her mouth, “He’s not picky anyway. He knows that he’ll like whatever I choose.”

Izaya takes a moment to glance around the restaurant. He drinks in the faces of the people around him, wondering if they would consider themselves to be better people than himself and Chiyo. They’re dressed in more obviously expensive clothing. They carry an air about them that is far more refined. He wonders if Chiyo chose this place simply for its elegance. If maybe she also doesn’t care too much about the basics of the wedding business and only cares about her future husband.

Clearly, he has money, Izaya thinks. If he can afford to host the reception at a place as fancy as this.

They’re tying up the last minute loose ends, tasting the entrees one last time before the wedding, taking in the ballroom and looking over the decor. He’d asked her why she hadn’t asked Tomoko to cater the wedding instead, and she’d laughed at him, as though he should have known better. 

That hadn’t sat too well with him at the time, but he’d forced himself to ignore it.

_“I don’t want her to have to work,”_ she’d explained, _“I want her to relax for once and enjoy herself.”_

He can understand that much, at least. He wishes for nothing more than to be allowed to relax as well, to enjoy even one vacation with Shizu-chan without being forced to work. He can’t stop himself from wondering how Shizuo must feel about this, if he’s upset about all of the time that they’re spending apart. If he might be wishing that Izaya didn’t have to work as well.

Shaking his head, he chides himself for thinking so domestically. If there’s anything that their relationship isn’t, it’s normal. They might be happy enough, functional enough, but they will never find themselves in a situation like Chiyo’s. Shizu-chan won’t be picking out the best flavors of wedding cake, and he definitely won’t find himself staying up all night compiling an invitation list.

“What’s that face for?” Chiyo asks, amusement tugging at the edges of her words, “Is the food that bad?”

With a twitch, he fixes his expression to one of unreadable calm. He sends her the most sincere smile that he can fabricate.

“It’s good,” he tells her, even though he can barely taste anything, “I was thinking about something unpleasant, that’s all.”

She sends him a sly grin, resting her elbow against the table and leaning forward.

“You know why I invited you, right?” she asks, raising a brow in question, “Of course, I love your company and all, but there’s something that I’ve been dying to ask you.”

Dread settles heavily in his belly. He rolls his eyes. He should have known when she called early this morning that there would be a catch. He’d felt so revived from a good night’s sleep that he hadn’t thought to read more into her invitation. He’d been eager to get out and stretch his legs, to bask in the warmth of the sun and take in the sights of so many foreign humans roving the city. Shizu-chan had made plans with Tomoko-chan, even offered to bring him along, but before he’d found a proper excuse to avoid the nosy woman, Chiyo had called.

Someone even nosier, he thinks, kicking himself mentally. Why had he thought that this would be such a good idea at the time?

“I know,” he sighs, setting his fork down on the plate and dabbing his lips with a thick, cloth napkin, “You’re going to ask why I refuse to move in with Shizu-chan, right? You’ve been dying to pester me about this since that idiot blurted it out.”

She doesn’t laugh this time, but a small smile plays across her lips. Her gaze flicks around to different faces as she mulls over what she wishes to say next. She’s smart enough to understand that she needs to be careful when she speaks around him. She knows that he might be able to weasel his way out of replying honestly if she says the wrong thing.

“Well,” she says after a few moments pass, “I noticed how weird you were acting about it. There’s probably some sneaky reason why, isn’t there? You were pretty lovey-dovey with him when you guys left. It wouldn’t be right if you suddenly got cold feet.”

He isn’t particularly comfortable with how well she just read him, but he tries not to let his astonishment show on his face. Chiyo, he knows, runs on a completely different wavelength than most people. She doesn’t care about the actions of the humans surrounding her. She isn’t interested in being popular or being wealthy as long as she’s happy. Her power is unique, he thinks, but her weaknesses reveal themselves in the way that she endlessly prattles on.

Her big mouth, he tells himself, could get her in trouble if he so wished for it to. He could tear her down with the same practiced ease that he’s torn down countless, stronger humans. So why doesn’t he? He isn’t quite sure. He’ll never understand the invisible force that stops him, time and time again, from teaching each and every one of the humans in this town why it’s never a good idea to dance with a God.

“Are you going to answer my question, or are you just going to sit there with that sneaky look on your face?”

He snaps to attention, forcing the heat from his cheeks and picking up his fork from his plate. Chiyo’s smile spreads further, impish with amusement as she stabs her fork into a different entree. 

“It’s complicated,” he tells her, and he still hasn’t figured out the right lie before he carries on, “Shizu-chan doesn’t seem to understand that not everything in the world can be as easy as in the movies. He seems to believe that if the prince charming character is _princely_ and _charming_ enough, everything will be okay in the end.”

Chiyo cocks her head to the side. She pats her lips with her napkin and takes a drink from one of the glasses between them. After a long pause, she asks him, “Do you think that Shizuo-kun is princely and charming?”

It’s definitely not the question that he was expecting. He despises the way that he sputters, choking a little on his own drink and beating a fist against his chest to quell his resounding coughs. Chiyo’s giggle is as insufferable as it always is. He really, truly cannot understand why he doesn’t just pit her bridesmaids against each other or pay off a few members of the waitstaff not to show up on her wedding day. She would deserve it, he thinks. She should know better than to open the cage after jabbing the lion so many times with a stick through the bars.

“That’s hardly any of your business,” he tells her, “And it’s completely irrelevant to your previous line of questioning. Are you really trying to get to the bottom of this, or are you just trying to be as annoying as possible?”

She tells him, both. It’s no fun talking to him if she can’t rile him up a little.

He hates that she makes that sound like a privilege, as though she is one of the few people who can really get under his skin. He hates the fact that she isn’t wrong even more.

“Shizu-chan was hurt last time that we came here,” he continues, pausing only to contemplate how much he’s willing to tell her, how far he’ll allow for her to peek into his private life, “He seems to think that he’s invincible, but that’s obviously not true. He’s a moron, of course. And he…”

He lets out a long breath. Chiyo sits silently, impatience rolling off of her in waves. 

“He doesn’t understand that there are a lot of people in this country who want him dead. There are people who will use our relationship against us— _against me_. I’m not exactly Mr. Popular either, as hard as I’m sure that is to believe.”

He isn’t particularly flattered by her snort, but he doesn’t dwell on it for too long. His thoughts swirl about in his head, a dark cloud looming above him as he mulls over just what he might be able to do to fix this.

To get Shiki off of his back, to shake off Koizumi… to protect Shizu-chan without ruining their relationship… To salvage whatever is left of them if Shizu-chan discovers the truth.

“You should really consider just telling Shizuo-kun what’s going on, you know,” Chiyo tells hims, resting her face against her hand, “He might not be invincible, but he does deserve to know. Wouldn’t you be a little pissed off if he thought so little of you that he wouldn’t even tell you why he was acting so weird?”

Of course he would, but Shizu-chan isn’t clever enough to keep secrets. Shizu-chan wouldn’t last more than a few hours before the truth would inevitably reveal itself, surely because of his own mindless incompetence. 

“Don’t even start with me,” Chiyo adds hurriedly, “He could be keeping secrets from you that you don’t know about. He’s not an idiot, you know. He might surprise you.”

He barks a laugh at the mere suggestion, trying to imagine what sorts of secrets Shizu-chan might keep. Oh, did he eat too much chocolate before bed? Was his shower a little bit longer in the morning for “perverted reasons”? Was he too distracted watching Izaya sleep to go to bed on time?

The last image sends a wave of heat over his cheeks. He shakes his head, squashing those thoughts before he can really comprehend them. 

“Shizu-chan isn’t keeping secrets,” he tells her, despite the doubt growing gradually in his chest, “He hates liars. He’d have to punch himself if he caught himself being untruthful about anything.”

He considers his own excuses. Shizu-chan does claim to hate liars, but he willingly falls asleep with one every night. He wonders if Shizu-chan even realizes this. He wonders if Shizu-chan might consider himself a liar by extension, if maybe he’s known all along that Izaya would rather scratch out his own eyes than be completely honest about anything. 

“He knows that I’m being dishonest,” he adds quietly, so low that he barely hears himself above the hum of the people around them, “It’s not like I’m sleeping with someone else. I'm not even doing anything illegal this time. He’s too dramatic.”

The look that crosses Chiyo’s face is sadder than he’d expected. She flicks her gaze to the table between them, dragging dark eyes from the wine glasses to the half-eaten samples. With fingers tugging nervously at the edges of her napkin, she finally speaks.

“Don’t you think that he deserves to be happy, Izaya-kun? Do you really think that this is fair, even if you’ve fooled yourself into thinking that it’s the right thing to do?”

He opens his mouth to retort, but he finds that he has nothing to say. No clever jabs, no further excuses. He’s at a loss, and so he closes his lips slowly, looking anywhere but into her questioning eyes.

A tenseness takes over the air between them. He thinks about Shizu-chan’s face as he’d pushed him up against the hotel room wall. He thinks about Shizu-chan begging him not to leave.

It’s not fair, he thinks, but nothing ever is. Chiyo might also think that all stories must have a happy ending, that life always gives out goodness to those who deserve it. Shizu-chan is a good person. He tries his hardest to be kind. Beyond his tantrums, he never breaks the law, always throws away his trash, always pays his rent on time. He's an honest monster with the purest of intentions, but that won't stop fate from gradually breaking him down. 

He shouldn’t be hurting, not like this. He’s felt enough pain in just twenty-four years to last a lifetime. 

But he knew what he was getting into when he chose to love a man like Orihara Izaya. 

He should have realized that happy endings are especially rare for those who don’t deserve them.

 

* * *

 

Shizuo trails closely behind Tomoko-san, eyeing the crowd around them suspiciously as they move through the streets. Tomoko-san walks with practiced confidence, and he tries to convince himself that he’s acting as her bodyguard, if only to gain the nerve that he needs to stop twitching every time that someone accidentally brushes against him.

He’d never realized how much the inhabitants of Ikebukuro avoided him. He’d never fathomed why he was able to move through the streets back home without much trouble at all. He’s not used to people bumping into him, to the quiet curses of businessmen who blame him when they collide. He’s not familiar with this constant need to quell his anger—counting back in his head so many times that the numbers are completely jumbled. 

When they reach the catering company, he can’t help the feeling of nostalgia that washes over him. The sign hanging out front needs a new paint job, and he forces himself to resist the urge to ask if she needs help doing that. There’s a line out front, winding all the way out around the sidewalk. She’s become so successful since Fukayama’s banquet. He almost doesn’t recognize the place with so many customers and so many new employees inside. 

They’re only stopping in for a minute, she tells him, then they’ll meet up with Chiyo for her dress fitting. 

“It’s the final one,” she says idly, greeting the girls working in the front as they pass through the familiar door into the back room, “She looked so beautiful the first time… I might cry again, so please don’t worry too much if I do.”

He doesn’t like the sound of that at all. He can’t remember the last time that he’s seen anyone cry—aside from a few losers begging for their lives after refusing to pay their debts—and the idea of watching a woman who he respects so much sobbing without doing anything to help her… His fists clench at the thought of it alone. 

Maybe weddings aren’t for people like him, he thinks. His temper flares at the most unusual of times. The sight of anyone crying might throw him into a rage that no amount of counting down will be able to stop. 

Tomoko-san grabs a few papers from the office. She signs some documents that an unrecognizable secretary hands her, and she beams up at him once she’s finished.

“Okay,” she says, a certain bounce in her step that he can’t ignore, “Are you ready to go?”

 

* * *

 

Izaya presses a finger firmly between his brows, jaw stiff as he works away the headache forming slowly beneath his skin. He listens as Kyou-chan prattles on about her most recent date with “Yoshi-kun”, going into painstaking detail about how surprisingly gentle his kisses are.

He wants to tell her, _“Kyou-chan, as interesting as this conversation is, I actually do not care at all”_ , but he knows that Chiyo has invited him along for moral support. And maybe to babysit, he muses. She told him about how pushy Kyou-chan has been since she’d been elected “maid of honor”, never seeming to understand that she doesn’t need to be right in the middle of the action in order to fulfill her duties. 

Chiyo is apparently capable of dressing herself. She’s done it all of her life. It’s astounding, really, considering how completely dull each of the girls sitting around him seem to be. 

Maybe she keeps moronic company to make herself feel more interesting. Maybe these are the life-long connections that she feels too guilty to sever. 

There’s a girl sitting three seats away who keeps griping about the temperature of the boutique. She’s making snide comments under her breath about “the man” who thinks that he has any place among the bridesmaids. She seems to think that Chiyo is either sleeping with him, or he’s gay. The girl sitting next to her thinks that it’s the latter.

“Look at that furry jacket,” she whispers, “No straight guy would be caught dead in that.”

He stares indignantly in the mirrors across from them—a circle of his reflection glowering back at him. His jacket has no sexuality, he tells himself. It’s chilly outside. Fur is gender-neutral. Completely acceptable for weather such as this. The idea that an article of clothing might be able to dictate someone’s sexuality is so baffling that he almost gives her a piece of his mind. 

She continues to berate him quietly, as though anyone in their group is speaking aside from Kyou-chan, and as though it isn’t easy enough to drown her out when they’re making such a poor show of being quiet.

“He’s kind of cute,” one girl says, “If you like gay guys.”

The other girl clicks her tongue, sneaking a glance in his direction.

“He looks like a Host,” she hisses, somehow managing to make even such a general statement sound like an insult, “I bet Hashimoto-san met him at some bar. I wonder if Kazuma-kun knows about their relationship? Would he be mad if he found out that she’s been running around with this guy all day?”

He can pick apart the differences in the names that she uses easily enough. These are clearly friends of Chiyo's fiancé’s, maybe even relatives, and they’re not particularly happy about the marriage. He wonders why they would even bother coming. It doesn’t make any sense, but of course, humans love to be petty. They love to put themselves in awful situations if only so they can complain about it. 

And these girls, he decides, are doing a beautiful job of complaining. 

Before he can delve into these thoughts much further, two additional figures are making their way toward the group. His eyes catch Tomoko-chan first, and he fakes his most brilliant smile. 

Until, of course, he remembers who invited Shizu-chan out this morning, and catches a glimpse of the man staggering over behind her.

“Oh, he’s cute,” one of the whispering girls coos, hand over her mouth despite how loud she’s being, “Is that her boyfriend or her son? She’s too old for him.”

Tomoko-chan is only in her thirties, so he tries to calculate just how old she would have been when she’d given birth to Shizu-chan if she were really his mother. Five? Maybe ten? Are these girls even more idiotic than they look?

Shizuo scratches nervously at his nose, eyeing Izaya in a way that makes his skin crawl. They’re on good terms, for the most part, but they still haven’t quite found the time to discuss where Izaya had sneaked off to last night. The weight of that impending conversation is smothering both of them. It’s a heavy cloud looming high above their heads, and when the rain comes…

He doesn’t know how he’ll avoid it, but he’s willing to run if he has to, if only to prolong it for as long as he can. 

It’s the coward’s way out, of course. It’s completely insane considering all of the things that they’ve been through, but if Shizu-chan can constantly surprise him by doing the dumbest thing imaginable, then maybe he can too. 

“Tomoko-san, Heiwajima-san,” Kyou-chan greets, standing quickly and rushing over to envelope Tomoko-chan in a tight hug, as though it’s been longer than a day since they’ve seen each other, “I’m so happy that you guys could make it! I was just telling Iza-chan about my date last night!”

Izaya twitches at the nickname, unable to deny the way that Shizuo’s reflection stands just a little straighter in the mirror at the sound of it as well. It’s deplorable, the idea that Koizumi has used such a disgusting name to refer to him so often that Kyou-chan finds herself using it absentmindedly as well. She doesn’t even seem to notice that she’s said anything weird, but when she moves forward to hug Shizu-chan, he shirks away. 

It doesn’t affect her like Izaya would have expected. She only pats him on the arm instead, telling him how happy she is that he could make it and offering him the seat next to Izaya. 

Chiyo’s fiancé’s friends mutter at her words, confirming among themselves that Izaya is, in fact, _very gay._

He doesn’t even want to consider lecturing them about how sexuality has nothing to do with the sex of the person who one might be dating, but he catches himself almost allowing the words to spill out. Orihara Izaya is not a sexual creature. His wants and needs are for all of humanity, and the fact that a monster sometimes curls up next to him in bed changes none of that. 

He’s not sure if he believes it himself, but this train of thought at least makes him feel a little better, even as Shizuo squeezes in beside him.

Tomoko-chan and Kyou-chan take a seat on the other side of him, chatting excitedly about how wonderful Chiyo is going to look when she finally finishes these alterations.

He wonders if she’ll seem any different when she walks out, if all of the sappy romance movies are even remotely accurate. Will she take those first few steps out of the fitting room, the light hitting her hair just right, sparkling with the sequins on her dress and bathing her in an angelic glow that will mesmerize all who behold her? Will Izaya find tears prickling at the corners of his eyes as he takes in the sight of her all dressed up and ready to marry the man of her dreams?

He doubts it, really. He can’t imagine that anything might bring him to tears after everything that he’s survived so far.

His phone buzzes, pulling him from his thoughts. Without thinking, he opens the text, the headache which has just started to fade since Kyou-chan moved over coming back three times as painfully as before.

 

_ Pervert (06:18: 59): You’re sitting next to my darling Kyou-chan, are you not? _

 

_ Pervert: (06: 19: 05): She’s very pretty, but not nearly as pretty as you. _

 

_ Pervert (06: 21: 54): I would do things to you that she could never even dream of. _

 

Shizu-chan isn’t craning his neck to spy, but Izaya hides his phone anyway. He didn’t realize that agreeing to these jobs would mean that Koizumi would harass him endlessly again. He would have fought harder, maybe, and found a way to avoid Shiki’s suspicions if he had known. 

He flinches as a hand comes to rest over his own. The warmth of it is startling; he hadn’t realized just how cold the room really is until now, until Shizu-chan’s ridiculous body heat has begun to warm his numbed fingers. Idly, he curls his fingers around Shizuo’s larger, rougher hand, watching those wide shoulders slump as Shizuo’s eyes try to meet his in their reflection. 

He thinks about Chiyo, soon to be married. He wonders how excited she must be to take on that man’s name. An odd custom, he reminds himself, but one that humans hold in the highest regard. 

“Say, Shizu-chan,” he draws out slowly, barely aware that he’s speaking at all, “If we were to get married, would you take my name, or would I take yours?”

A deafening silence settles over the group. It seems—he realizes only too late—that he wasn’t being quite as discreet as he’d originally thought. 

All eyes settle on them. Shizuo sits up straighter, tugging his hand away. His cheeks are pink even in the mirror across the room. His eyes burn tiny holes in the pristine carpet.

“Ah, well, uh,” he’s stumbling over his words. Izaya wishes that he would just not reply at all, “Heiwajima Izaya doesn’t sound too bad.”

Neither does Orihara Shizuo, but he’s too mortified to argue. His phone buzzes again as Kyou-chan makes some abhorrent comment about “lovebirds planning their wedding already”. Tomoko-chan seems so stunned, so absolutely overwhelmed with nervousness, that she can only nod, wide-eyed as she works her gaze between them.

Another vibration rattles through him. The hushed whispers of everyone sitting around them are muted as he counts the buzzes, the countless dirty messages that Koizumi is sending him in this endless, sickening powerplay.

It was a stupid question, an absolutely ridiculous idea.

He can’t even protect Shizu-chan long enough to move in with him. 

But maybe he can put a stop to this. Maybe he can end this at the source. 

It will be ugly, and maybe Shizu-chan will despise him if he ever catches wind of it, but he pulls his phone from his pocket nonetheless. 

He barely has time to send the text before Chiyo finally leaves the dressing room. She’s beautiful, just like everyone has told him.

But Izaya doesn’t shed a tear. He doesn’t feel anything at all. 

Numb, tired, nothing registers but the heavy dread coiling deep within his belly.  
  


__ ‘If sleeping with you will end this, then let’s end it.’  
  


He doesn’t even have the strength to hate himself anymore. 

 

* * *

 

As the sun sets slowly behind the tops of the buildings, Koizumi watches the street lamps flicker on tone by one. Far below his room at the top of the building, salarymen wander home from their buses and taxis, noses pointed so closely to their phone screens that it’s a wonder that they don’t bump into each other. 

The curtains are drawn open entirely, the wide window pouring an orange glow into the unlit room. His television sputters in the background, the volume turned far too low to understand what the characters on the sitcom are saying. He can barely make out the laugh track, let alone the jokes. He wonders if Orihara likes these silly programs. He wonders if Orihara has any time for television at all. 

He doesn’t know how he’ll escape the monster two nights in a row, but he’s willing to gamble that Izaya will figure it out somehow. He’s a man of his word, truly, and with such an expensive offer as his freedom on the table, Koizumi doubts that he’ll let this opportunity slip through his fingers.

Shiki had warned him of Orihara’s resilience— _ ”He’ll do just about anything to come out on top, so don’t underestimate him. He’s the roach that won’t die no matter how many times you squash it under your boot. You can make him suffer as much as you want, but he’ll still make it out alive.” _

But he knows, of course, he could read it on Orihara’s face the very first time that they met. A proud, beautiful, dangerous man. The most pleasurable sort of person to break. 

Shiki might not have expected for things to go down this path. He might have anticipated Koizumi’s charming sort of torture: the sleepless nights, the impossible jobs. The harassment and the constant barrage of messages. He knows Koizumi’s character well enough to understand that most of his battles are of wills. 

He’s growing old, and so maybe the violence finally needs to rest.

But maybe even without tying a few cement blocks to his feet, Koizumi will still best this infamous Orihara Izaya. Maybe his winning hand is traveling up the elevator right at this very moment, as he finds himself staring at the characters moving about on TV. 

The elevator clicks as it rises, as the traveler passes each floor. He counts the seconds in his head, wonders if Orihara might have changed into something seductive for this very meeting, or if he’d decided to bundle up against the chill of early Spring evenings. 

It doesn’t matter, he decides. In the end, he’ll still feel naked as he makes his way home. The ghost of Koizumi’s touch will haunt him for the rest of his miserable days. 

The elevator dings as the door opens. He watches Orihara’s darkened reflection in the window—a shadow against the backdrop of the city, a spindly, waifish thing creeping nervously into the room. 

“So you came,” Koizumi greets him, a broad grin exposing pearly canines, the glass of wine sitting comfortable in his hand jostled as he turns around, “I considered the possibility that maybe you’d chickened out.”

Orihara scoffs, flinching as the elevator door clicks closed behind him. He doesn’t move any further into the room. He glares at the twin couches in the center of the room, sharp eyes cutting apart the decor as though it’s offended him somehow. 

“I made the offer,” he spits, no games, no masks, only this bitter hatred that Koizumi knows is a rarity to witness, “Why would I back out of my own deal?”

He wants to argue  _ “It’s more common than you would think” _ , but opts instead to close the distance between them. He sets his glass on the windowsill, sweeping his arms forward and resting one hand on Orihara’s bony shoulder, the other against his cheek. 

His grin widens as Orihara twitches. A mouse in a trap, he thinks. A little boy who has finally discovered that no matter how many knives that he carries with him, he’s still too small to stop the real monsters.

“What does Heiwajima think about all of this?” he questions, and the way that Izaya’s brows knit produces an answer that no amount of deception can ever cover up, “Does he think that it’s completely acceptable for you to sleep with someone else? Is it not cheating if it’s with a human? Just no animals, right?”

Izaya’s eyes meet his in the darkness. There’s a fire burning deep within the ashen depths, a pointed edge that threatens him despite the precarious situation that Orihara has found himself in. 

“Oh?” he tips his head to the side, slipping the hand from Izaya’s cheek down to the exposed collarbone above the neckline of his shirt, “So he doesn’t know. Of course, that beast is your trump card, but you’d never be smart enough to use him, right?”

Orihara shakes his head, pulling away. 

“Let’s just get this over with.”

A hollow voice echoing against open walls. The sun setting far off in the distance. 

A city stories below, unaware of the events transpiring so close to the orange-cast clouds.

A jacket falling noiselessly against glossy tile. Dark eyes closing, pink lips parting.

And big hands reaching forward and pulling him toward the circle of couches. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a little shorter than it should be, but I might have overestimated how much I could write in a week. Since my last update, I've written over twenty-thousand words for various stories, so... I think I need to rest. 
> 
> Anyway, this chapter is a little... sketchy, isn't it? Oh man, the cliffhanger. I feel both proud and regretful. I am so sorry.
> 
> Before I leave, I'd like to mention that I might be moving soon. I'll try to organize it so I won't be without internet for too long, but last time, it took them almost a month to come and set it up, so... if I don't update randomly, that will be why. I'll keep everyone on tumblr updated, but we'll see! If that happens, hopefully I'll still find the time to write between packing up my things and moving them over.
> 
> As always, thank you so much for reading! See you guys next Wednesday!


	6. Nebulous

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> To begin again, and to end again.

Izaya stumbles through the front doors of Koizumi’s building, scowling as he works a hand over the marks adorning his neck. Tiny bruises purple against his skin, illuminated in the moonlight as the doorman bows behind him.

There’s no car waiting to take him to his destination, but the storm brewing in his thoughts is far too dizzying for him to find the will to care.

It takes him a moment to register the pain blossoming against his hipbone, but when the memories finally fade back—fuzzy to lucid, blackness cracking open and revealing the startled look in dark, beady eyes—

He stops in the middle of the sidewalk, tipping his head back and baring his throat to the moon.

And he smiles.

 

* * *

 

_“I didn’t think that you would come to me so easily,”_

Koizumi’s words had buzzed through the silence, mingling with the blood roaring in his ears. Izaya had allowed himself to be pushed down against the couch, caged in with big arms like a canary staring a hungry house cat in the face.

 _“And yet, here I am,”_ he’d croaked, a manicured sort of fear in his voice, a quiver shoved in just the right syllables, _“So get it over with.”_

Koizumi had dragged himself onto the couch, framing Izaya’s hips with his knees and leaning back against his heels to shrug off his jacket. Hardened muscle had moved beneath the smoothness of his dress shirt—shoulders shifting as he’d taken his time unbuttoning each button and sliding it backward to reveal an expanse of wild, colorful patterns.

Izaya’s eyes had met those of a squid—a pale blue monster drawn out across Koizumi’s chest, tentacles stretched out and coiling around his back. The tattoos were jarring, and he’d made no effort to mask the surprise on his face. Koizumi’s toothy grin glinted in the reflection of moonlight, filtering through his open windows.

He’d sat still for a long moment, a titan in the night—humongous, overwhelming, predatory and proud. Maybe he’d considered that Izaya would back out at that point. Maybe he’d given him just enough room to finally shirk away.

But Izaya had only reached out, tracing the sculpted lines of the squid’s head down to the tip of a single tentacle, savoring the feeling of a pulse skyrocketing beneath his touch.

 _“What are you waiting for, Yoshi-kun_ _?”_ He’d asked, voice liquid poison, eyes alight with a rampant fire that might just have burned the whole place down, _“Aren’t you going to claim your prize?”_

A knee between Koizumi’s legs, he’d found no hardness tucked there. He was rewarded with a shudder, a sharp intake of breath. The streetlights far below had cast a line of white across Koizumi’s face, darkened the shadows of scars across his skin. He’d looked less proud in that moment, as he’d watched Izaya with unsure eyes. Deflated, maybe. Even fearful. Izaya had forced down the smirk threatening to crack open his lips. He’d fastened a nervousness of his own into his fingers, pulling away. Seeming to buckle under the pressure of such a big man hovering so close above him.

Koizumi hadn’t moved forward, hadn’t made good on all of those promises and all of the threats. He’d been rooted to the spot, watching Izaya carefully as an unfamiliar frown had worked its way over his features.

With an effort that had seemed gargantuan, he’d leaned forward, dragging his fingers under Izaya’s shirt and pulling it up to expose his stomach.

And a second had passed—then two, three—and the minutes ticked by until it felt as though an hour had slipped away. Izaya waited patiently, an expression of pure _nothing_ dawning across his features. He’d worked a shiver over his skin. He’d willed his heartbeat to pick up any time that those calloused fingers worked their way over his belly.

Koizumi had leaned down as though to kiss him, and only then, did Izaya pounce.

They’d become a tangle of limbs rolling about on the couch. Koizumi had kneed him hard in the side, a panicked yelp strangling through his throat. Their positions flipped until Izaya was straddling his hips, knife against his jugular, Koizumi’s fingers wrapped around his throat. He'd worked their positions slowly back to normal, but Izaya still didn't remove his knife. Back pressed firmly against the couch, a knee jammed into his hip to keep him there. The fingers had stabbed even harder into his throat. 

Koizumi sat still then, like a rat in a trap, like the coward that Izaya always knew that he was. His pulse raced beneath the sharp edge of the knife.

And he’d spoken, so quiet that it seemed to be no more than a mere huff of breath, “How long have you known?”

 

* * *

 

Izaya allows the laughter to rattle through him. He clutches his sides, tears hinting at the corners of his eyes.

_How long had he known?_

Koizumi is truly an idiot.  


* * *

 

 _“Known what, exactly?”_ Izaya had questioned, spreading his fingers out to lay his open palm against Koizumi’s chest, reveling in the erratic thundering of his heart, _“That you’re a coward? That Shiki has been bribing you to harass me? Or could it be,_ _‘_ How long have you known that I can’t become aroused at all without the help of a few little pills’?”

Koizumi had flinched at that, as though the white hot lick of Izaya’s words had burned him. He’d looked smaller in that moment than Izaya had ever thought possible: a shaved lion, perhaps, mourning the loss of its wild mane and the only thing that could fool anyone into seeing it as more than a shabby old house cat.

He’d drank in Koizumi’s deflation hungrily, an electricity surging through him as his eyes had searched that hardened face. Koizumi allowed his arms to fall limply at his sides. He’d cast a wary gaze out of the window, overlooking the city beyond.

 _“Shiki-san warned me about you,”_ He’d whispered, barely even there at all, _“He’d told me that you wouldn’t be an easy one to crack.”_

Izaya’s giggle might have sounded more like a gunshot, with the way that Koizumi had shuddered. He’d dragged his fingers down the scarred and tattered edges of the tattoos painting the old man’s skin, noting the contrast of pale against tanned, of untouched against battered.

So much more muscular than Shizu-chan could ever hope to be, but so much less strong.

 _“He used the cockroach metaphor, didn’t he?”_ Izaya had asked, mirth pooling in each word as Koizumi scooted back to rest at the end of the couch, _“He seems quite fond of that one, although I’d consider myself to be more of a God than a useless beetle.”_

 _“Roaches aren’t beetles,”_ Koizumi choked, _“They’re part of the order Blattodea. Beetles are part of a different order called Coleoptera. They’re not the same thing.”_

Izaya might have waved a dismissive hand in the air, but he decided that it would be far more impactful if he stayed in his spot on the couch. His legs were spread wide, one arm arched as though still touching Koizumi’s exposed chest. His other was tucked above his head, where Koizumi had left it when he’d pulled away that iron grip.

The only thing that might have wrapped it all together would have been some obvious form of arousal, if only to clarify that he was not lacking in the ways that Koizumi obviously was, but he couldn’t even consider bringing himself to that new low if only to prove a point.

Even if the mere idea of Shizu-chan pinning him down in such a ferocious display of dominance would have gotten the job done just fine.

After a long stretch of silence, Koizumi swung his feet around to rest against the floor, hands in his lap. He’d watched the characters moving about on the television unseeingly, a haunted glow reflected in beady eyes as he’d finally allowed himself to speak again.

The quiver in his voice was music in Izaya’s ears. He’d wondered why he hadn’t called the bluff so many months ago, why he’d been so blind as to rely on Shizu-chan's dull wit and monstrous strength to take care of a job that could so easily be wrapped up, if only he’d lowered himself to sending such a disgusting text.

He’d hated himself with every ounce of his being for sending those words, for pretending, for even a moment, that he was dumb enough to play right into Koizumi’s hand.

 _“Shiki-san thought that you might figure it out eventually,”_ Koizumi had drawn out, a slow drawl to his words, as though he were drunk off of his own disappointment, _“He told me to tell you something important if you managed to get this far.”_

A pregnant pause, a tittering of bugs seeking the light pouring in from inside and tapping against the outside of the window, the slow beating of Izaya’s heart as he’d come down from his high, and finally—

_“He’s not going to hurt Heiwajima-san. He wanted me to tell you that, as a show of professional courtesy, he’s going to look the other way on this one. But he wants you to be careful, because not everyone is going to be so kind.”_

The use of Shiki’s name in the same phrase as _‘kind’_ had sent laughter rolling through him once more. It was more of a chuckle than the howling that would come later. More of a soft bubbling of his own amusement drowning out Koizumi’s misery.

A quiet laugh track had buzzed from the TV. Koizumi had grimaced, tugging his eyes away from the screen.

 _“And I would like to ask you, as a show of professional courtesy,”_ Izaya had to strain his ears to hear. He’d reached up toward the ceiling tiles, imagining the warmth of skin beneath his fingertips, the long scar staining Shizu-chan’s milky chest that he might have been tracing if he hadn’t decided to slink away again—

_“You want me to finish the Sawamatsu job, correct?”_

A terse nod. A silence that should have been smothering, but Izaya could only smirk as he’d pulled himself up.

_“He’s a particularly disgusting human. It would be a shame not to see this through.”_

And they’d talked business. Koizumi was far more reserved than Izaya could have ever imagined. Take away the spiked collar and replace it with one that released a small shock. Put a fence around the yard and a muzzle over the mouth, and any dog could seem just as pathetic and defeated.

He’d relished the victory—so sweet and so aged to perfection. He’d wondered why Shizu-chan never had any faith in him, why he’d always seemed to think that brute force could win in the end and keen planning could not.

One more job, Koizumi had told him. Get Sawamatsu to agree to meet up at a certain location (scrawled gracefully over a stray napkin on the coffee table), and that would be that. A bullet in the pervert’s head, maybe. Cement blocks tied to his feet.

In the end, it didn’t matter.

He would be just another human rotting away beneath the ocean’s surface—fish food for Koizumi’s beloved squid.

Then Izaya could wipe his hands of it.

And maybe even start looking for some nice apartments between Ikebukuro and Shinjuku.

 

* * *

 

Shizuo runs a frazzled hand through his hair, pacing back and forth from the hotel windows to the door leading out into the hall. He imagines that a trail might begin to form if he continues on like this, but he can’t manage to sit still long enough to stop it from happening.

He’s muttering under his breath, cursing Izaya with everything that he has as he glares down at the phone in his hand, willing himself to be gentle despite the turmoil roiling in his chest and not crush it in his palm.

He’s watching the tiny arrow move about the screen, hesitating at a familiar building for entirely too long. He remembers that building only from the single meeting that he’d taken part in there—the first run-in with the man who he hadn’t realized at the time would end up becoming the bane of his existence.

Somehow, he’d usurped even Izaya. He isn’t entirely sure what the little shithead might think about that revelation, but he can’t bring himself to care.

Tomoko-san had downloaded a tracking device to his phone, and for the life of him, he can’t figure out how she managed to track Izaya. She’d claimed that Chiyo was able to figure these things out—something with an IP number or a serial code, or something that he has no business ever understanding—and despite the headache aching through his skull at the thought of so many complicated procedures, he’s thankful for their hard work and dedication.

He reminds himself to be especially nice at Chiyo’s wedding. Only two days before, and she’d still found the time to toil away, wasting precious hours just to help him out.

The arrow that indicates where Izaya is standing suddenly lurches forward. He’s moving away from Koizumi’s building at shocking speed—which Shizuo only decides is probably in the form of a taxi after too many moments have passed.

He’s traveling through the line of shops leading to Tomoko’s catering company until he takes a sudden turn. He continues forward, unyielding, until he reaches a district with a list of business names that Shizuo knows are anything but innocent.

 _‘Pretty Kitty’_ could be a cat bar, but _‘Peek-a-Boo’_ sounds off alarms in his head that send every ounce of blood pooling his cheeks.

Nondescript strip clubs and Host joints pass until the car halts in front of a building near the end of the street.

 _‘Dragon’s Den’_ the text reads, and he’s quicker to react to this name.

The business card, the number scrawled over the address in hurried hand. Izaya reeking of cheap food as he’d crawled in the morning after an all-nighter. Koizumi pulling so many invisible strings.

Just working another job, Izaya had told him.

Shizuo feels sick to his stomach.

His next actions are nothing to be proud of, but everything is a blur as he grabs a jacket from the back of the couch and swipes his keys from the dresser.

Slamming the door gracelessly on his way out, he’s seeing so much red that he doesn’t even remembered to greet the doorman as he passes through.

Koizumi’s building or the Red Light District, he isn’t sure where he’ll head first.

But there will be blood, he tells himself—pulse pounding deafeningly in his ears.

Someone will pay for all of this headache, this stress, the sleepless nights and the countless lies. Someone will answer for Izaya’s strange behavior and the secrets that he’s chosen to keep.

He isn’t sure who will pay, but they will.

Koizumi’s skull cracking between his fingers, the face of whichever man Izaya is tailing caving in beneath his fist.

An entire strip club full of low-lives learning what sort of monster stalks through their city’s streets.

It doesn’t matter, not really.

He was getting better for such a long time. Tom-san talks of addiction sometimes, of quitting smoking, of drinking less.

He says, _“A relapse every so often is okay, as long as you remember to get back on your feet.”_

But Shizuo is so angry that he isn’t sure how he’ll snap out of it.

Landing with Izaya in his arms, learning to live like normal people.

Spending the rest of his life in prison for murdering whichever sorry asshole gets in his way.

 

It doesn’t matter.

 

It doesn’t matter.

 

It doesn’t matter.

 

* * *

 

The doorman lets him in with a nod, and Izaya isn’t entirely sure how he’s supposed to feel about that. He’s ushered past the line winding along the sidewalk, beyond the pouting girls in their stiletto shoes and the men who jeer as he walks by.

The bouncer hands him off to another man—tall and gaunt, donning a suit that looks far more expensive that it probably is. He catches the name _‘Tokaji-san’_ as the bouncer bows and passes him along, and the circuits in Izaya’s brain buzz to life as he searches his memory for a mention of that name.

Tokaji Eito. The man in charge of running Sawamatsu’s chain of restaurants.

He ignores the girls dancing on tables high above them, the jiggling, naked breasts and the false smiles. He can’t be bothered to take in the gaping idiots standing far below, offering up bills of ridiculous value if only to catch one of the girls’ attention.

The club is shrouded in darkness, hazy with smoke and reeking of cheap food and overpriced booze. He scrunches his nose, willing the ugly sneer from his face and convincing himself to look as cool and collected as he needs to be in order to get the job done.

He might regret not wearing something more revealing, as Sawamatsu had requested, if the idea of that alone didn’t make him feel ill.

Tokaji leads him through a door marked with _‘Staff’_ , down a long hallway with lights somehow even dimmer than those out by the bar. He counts the doors as they pass—one, two, three, then four—until they reach the fifth door near the end of the hall. There are three more beyond it, and he wonders why such a tacky dive of a restaurant—nightclub—bar—whatever they’re marketing themselves as needs so many offices.

He wonders which rooms house which weapons, or if there are workers holed away within each individual office, scrubbing the serial numbers off of different guns.

Tokaji knocks three times, crisp and evenly spaced. Izaya files this information away lest Koizumi need it later. It might be code, after all. There might be special knocks for special occasions, and since Izaya is dropping in unannounced, this one must mean that there’s an unexpected surprise awaiting the moron on the other side of the door.

Sawamatsu’s tired face appears as the door pushes open. Glassy-eyed and reeking of alcohol, he cracks a jagged smile as he spots Izaya standing behind Tokaji.

“Ms. Waitress,” he greets, low and slurred, “I thought you’d call first.”

Izaya plasters on a smile of his own. His heart rate spikes within his ribcage, pattering against his bones as blood rushes through his veins. This man, Sawamatsu, might not be alive within the day. This man, a moron who thinks that he can get away with anything, is greeting an enemy with open arms.

He isn’t entirely sure why the criminals in Aomori are so much dumber than the ones back home. He doesn’t know how Koizumi has had such a hard time tracking this guy down, or if he’s even tried at all.

But he bows shallowly in greeting, swings his hips slightly as he passes Tokaji and slips through the open door into Sawamatsu’s office. He takes in tacky decor—the glossy computer desk, the oversized television. The leopard-print rug and narrow wine cabinet. He notes the light playing off of the glassy rims of half-filled glasses, the countless open bottles, the glow of the computer screen airing security footage of the girls dancing naked on the tops of tables.

He’s acutely aware of Sawamatsu’s arousal, of what he’d been up to before they’d interrupted him. He understands the danger in the same why that Shizu-chan must understand the danger of a man brandishing a knife in his face: _‘this would be bad for any normal person, but I, of course, am not a normal person.’_

He takes a seat in the one of the two clashing, zebra-print chairs. It swivels about as he makes himself comfortable, serene and calm, the definition of collected if he’d ever seen it before. He crosses one leg over the other, lazy, calculated, inviting.

Sawamatsu’s grin broadens. He closes the door.

He draws nearer, a large shadow moving through the artificial light. He might liken himself to a predator, but the knife slipping from the secret pocket within Izaya’s sleeve, resting comfortably in his palm—it might prove otherwise.

His face is mere centimeters away from Izaya’s. His booze-soaked breath is all that Izaya can focus on. In a moment, he’ll use the pervert’s own weight against him. He’ll pin him to the floor, press his knife against that thick throat, and he’ll tell him:

_“I’m not here for fun tonight, I’m afraid. But if you like it rough, I want you to meet me in a special place later on.”_

And the moron won’t think twice about it, he knows. He’ll show up at Koizumi’s spot, and he’ll meet his end in the same manner as a fly seeking the light of a bug zapper. Quick and painful. Deafening, but unnoticed.

Just as he’s readying himself for the attack, an unnamable noise bellows from down the hall. It’s the lurching of metal, the pops of gunshots. The screams of women and men mingling into a single, overwhelming howl of terror.

They both jolt at the sound. Sawamatsu tears away, eyes widening in the dark. The computer’s glow plays against the wrinkles on his skin, hollowing out his eyes and shadowing his lips. He’s gaunt with fear, with surprise. Izaya can’t help but grin.

But the sounds are drawing nearer fast. There’s the crack at the end of the hall, a scraping that he can’t quite put a name to. There are countless voices screaming, calling for help. One bang, then two. Then three and four. He flinches each time that the bangs draw nearer. The crack of gunshots follows. The yelling becomes more pronounced— _”What the fuck is that thing?!” “Hey! This is your last chance! Get the Hell out of here or we’ll kill you!” “Jesus Christ, are bullets even going to work on it?!”_

He understands what’s going on before the door caves in. He’s expecting the beautiful face to reveal itself through the foot-shaped hole. It’s contorted in rage, filthy with dust, with dirt, with blood.

He isn’t surprised to see Heiwajima Shizuo standing in the wreckage as the door flies from the hinges and barrels straight into Sawamatsu, throwing him back and knocking everything from his desk onto the floor.

Through the popping of electricity and the clattering of breaking glass, Izaya isn’t shocked by Shizuo’s angry yelling— _”What the fuck are you doing here?! You said that you were going out to buy fucking sushi, you idiot! This isn’t any sushi place that I’ve ever heard of!”_

But he is surprised, of course. Shizu-chan can never allow him to live a single day without doing something that he would never expect for him to do. He has to shake things up. He has to make waves. Maybe it’s his monstrous nature. Maybe it’s the only way that he understands how to live.

Izaya isn’t shocked that Shizu-chan found him. He isn’t shocked to see him causing a scene when it would have been so easy to have gotten this job done on his own without the use of brute strength.

But he is surprised, of course, to find a beaten and bloody Koizumi tucked in a headlock under Shizuo’s arm.

 

* * *

 

Koizumi listens as the elevator door closes behind Izaya, staring forward at nothing in particular as his heart eventually slows its rapid beating. He thinks about the bottle of pills that he left at home, the things that he’d threatened to do that were nothing more than empty threats. He doesn’t know how Izaya figured that part out, and maybe he doesn’t want to know.

Shiki-san had told him, over a year ago, _“He’ll find your weaknesses eventually, and he’ll chip away at them until you’re nothing. A cockroach, that’s all that he is. He feeds on the wreckage that he leaves in his wake. If you have even one insecurity, even one crack in your armor, he’ll take advantage of that. So don’t be an idiot and rush into this like you don’t have anything to hide.”_

Maybe he hadn’t believed Shiki-san as much as he should have. Maybe he’d imagined that his old friend had become soft in such a comfortable position within his own group. He’d envisioned Shiki-san sitting in a nice office, bossing around lower ranking members and never needing to dirty his own hands. He’d thought that an informant couldn’t ever amount to much more than a sneaky rat, that a man who made trouble for his own group would be taken out quickly and quietly.

And maybe he’d underestimated Orihara Izaya even after meeting him, even after spending a month harassing him relentlessly. Maybe he’d thought that Orihara’s only trump card came in the form of his lover—a monster of unspeakable strength, capable of destroying anything that unwittingly found its way into his grasp—and that Shiki-san was simply too afraid of angering the beast to ever put a stop to Orihara’s awful behavior.

But now, as a shiver works its way over his skin, as the bugs continue to assault the window and the ending credits roll on the TV, he considers that maybe he was wrong. He’d heard Shiki-san’s warning, in the same way that a child hears their mother tell them to be careful, to never ride their bike beyond the mailbox at the end of the block. But he’d grown cocky, he’d found safety in his own strength. He’d grown soft in his own position, high above everyone else in his group.

His reflection in the window is not one that he recognizes. A frail, scared, bested man. Another name on the ever-growing list of men who have been far too stupid to break Orihara Izaya.

A statistic, he laughs, of men far too weak to outsmart a single roach.

He’s buttoning the last button of his dress shirt when he hears the clamoring in the elevator. He recognizes the voice of his doorman, the hollering of two of his bodyguards. He can hear a fight breaking out. He wonders if another vagrant has unknowingly wandered inside. He wonders if some no-name family member has come to avenge the death of their loved one.

An ex wife’s mourning mother. A smuggler's vengeful lover.

The face that greets him when the doors open, however, is all-too familiar.

Heiwajima Shizuo bashes the head of the last bodyguard standing against the wall of the elevator. His voice is such a garbled string of curses that Koizumi can barely keep up. His speech only speeds up as he turns forward and they lock eyes, but he’s moving in slow motion as he steps over the unconscious bodies littering the floor.

There’s an oozing bullet wound in Heiwajima’s shoulder, but other than that, he seems unscathed. Koizumi’s stomach drops as he spots the holes littering the inside of the elevator. Heiwajima has never killed anyone, right…? Ota-san had sworn up and down that the monster had some sort of “gentle spirit”, that he truly hated violence, that he wouldn’t hurt anyone unprovoked.

Ota-san is an idiot. This single thought whirls through his head on an endless repeat as Heiwajima draws closer and closer. Koizumi’s legs are rubber, his knees knock incessantly.

He tries to move further back, but catches the couch cushions, falling back and sitting still—as though Heiwajima might not see him, if only he doesn’t move at all.

“H-Heiwajima-san,” his voice is nothing but a whisper, “O-Orihara-san isn’t h-here! He just left! I-I can give you his address if—if—”

Before he even realizes it, Heiwajima has slipped through the opening of the couches. He’s towering above, the air surrounding him swirling with the heat of his anger. Even the bugs have stopped pattering against the windows. Even the television seems to have been scared into silence by his rage alone.

Koizumi is dragged upward by the collar of his shirt. He can’t bring himself to stand up straight. He’s crouched awkwardly, staring up into dark eyes, glowing with something as terrifying as it is unreadable.

Heiwajima doesn’t speak, but the fist that he connects to Koizumi’s jawbone with a deafening crack speaks louder than anything that Koizumi could have even imagined that he’d say.

Two more punches. He’s thrown down against the couch so hard that it scrapes against the floor and hits the wall. He can hear the television smacking, creaking against its screws. He wonders what his enemies might think of him when they find out the cause of his death:

Impaled by a television. Beaten to death by something that can’t possibly be human.

He remembers Heiwajima’s anger on the night that he'd tested his strength, so many months ago—but only for a moment. His terror-stricken mind can only comprehend the image of those men flying through the air for so long before he feels that he might faint.

“You’re going to bring me to him,” Heiwajima growls, feral, inhuman, “And you’re going to get down on your fucking knees and beg for his forgiveness, got it?!”

Koizumi nods without even registering the movements. His head bobs up and down in quick successions. Quivering blackness hints at the corners of his vision.

Heiwajima grabs him by the throat and hauls him up. He’s tucked underneath a skinny arm, locked in this chokehold all the way down the elevator and out into the street.

He tells his chauffeur not to panic as they come closer. He reassures the poor man that everything is okay. His voice quakes, his entire body seems to shake in this overbearing panic.

Heiwajima keeps him in this hold all the way to their destination.

Even as he’s barreling through the crowds inside of _Dragon’s Den_ , he never lets go.

Koizumi finds himself thinking, straddling the line between holding his own and pissing his pants, that if Orihara Izaya is a cockroach, Heiwajima Shizuo must be the nuke that only a roach could survive.

It’s romantic, maybe, in the most depraved way that anyone could ever imagine.

It’s funny, almost, in a sickening sort of fashion.

But right now, as Heiwajima stands in the threshold of Sawamatsu’s office—electrical fires spitting behind him, bathing him in the orange glow of flames as he takes out the bad guy and stumbles forward to reclaim his lover—Koizumi can only find himself thinking one thing:

_‘This guy really is a super hero. Just like Ota-san said.’_

 

* * *

 

Izaya watches the scene unfolding in front of him as calmly as he can.

Shizu-chan throws Koizumi to the floor like a rag doll, moving further into the room and tossing the door away from Sawamatsu. To his credit, Sawamatsu is still conscious. He’s sputtering like an idiot, hands flailing in the air as Shizuo shakes him.

“Whatever shady shit you’re doing, fucking cut it out!” Shizuo bellows, and Izaya almost laughs at the sight—the idea of anyone telling an illegal weapons dealer to “cut it out”—but he knows that if anything can convince a criminal to change their ways, it’s bearing witness to Shizuo’s horrifying strength.

“And you,” Shizu-chan turns to glower in his direction, “Don’t fucking sit there with that dumbass smile on your face! You can’t just sneak away in the middle of the fucking night and expect for me not to do anything about it!”

Izaya puts up his hands in a defensive show. His smile widens as Koizumi drags himself to a seated position, and only then does Shizuo seem to remember that he’s even there.

He drops Sawamatsu to the floor. The poor bastard probably doesn’t even know what hit him. He’s surely reasoning with God for his pathetic life, vowing to turn over a new leaf if only this vengeful angel might find his way back into heaven.

Izaya scrunches his nose. He doesn’t like the direction that this metaphor is headed.

Shizu-chan, an angel? What a joke.

Shizuo moves closer to Koizumi, nudging him with his foot and urging him forward.

“You remember what I said, right?” He huffs, and Koizumi nods so many times that his head is a blur, “Get the fuck over there and start begging.”

Izaya steps back as Koizumi scoots forward. He bows so low that his forehead almost touches the floor.

In this moment, if Izaya were a normal person, maybe he would feel bad for the poor man. Emasculated and beaten up all in one night. Forced to bow down to the man who’d just humiliated him less than an hour ago.

But he’s not normal, not by any means. In this moment, he feels nothing but a swell of pride, and maybe, just a little—

He’s happy that Shizu-chan decided to meddle this time.

“Orihara-san—”

“ _Sama_ ,” Shizu-chan barks, and Izaya stifles a laugh.

“Shizu-chan, if you’re going to make him apologize, he already did his penance,”  he says, and the look that Koizumi sends up at him—so thankful, so relieved—is almost worth the last few day’s worth of headaches, “Honestly, I have everything under control. If you thought that it was necessary to barge in here and ruin everything, you could have at least called—”

“ _Called_?!” Shizuo moves forward so quickly that Koizumi can barely scamper away in time, “You wanted me to _call you and let you know_?! After all of the shit that you’ve kept secret?! Did I owe you that, you shitty fucking louse?! Did I owe you the fucking courtesy of a phone call when you couldn’t even tell me what the Hell was going on?!”

His fists are balled at his sides. Izaya’s eyes flick to the bloody wound staining his shirt. A string of panic runs through him, chilling up his spine. But Shizuo doesn’t seem to notice. His rageful gaze is locked only on Izaya’s face. He’s shaking in his anger, the air popping with heat around him as he takes another step forward.

“I fucking _begged_ you to let me know what the Hell was going on,” he breathes, each syllable laced with such fury that only the Monster of Ikebukuro could ever be capable of, “I would have liked a goddamn phone call, you know! You could have just told me _‘That miserable bastard Koizumi’s dragged me on another stupid job!’_ But no! I get fucking—f-fucking _dirty pictures_ with no explanation! I get your dumb ass telling me that you want to _marry me_ , then sneaking off and lying again!”

He’s so close that Izaya can feel his spit sprinkling on his face, each word emphasized with the hiss of air puffing through his nostrils. This pure, unadulterated indignation. This absolute hatred. It reminds him of their fights before all of this happened—Shizu-chan's howl of his name tearing through the city, the barrage of random weapons thrown his way.

A spike of adrenaline works its way through him. He tries to convince himself that the arousal that he’s feeling is because of stress, because of the excitement of an oncoming fight. It has nothing to do with Shizuo finally stepping up and telling him how things are going to be from now on.

It definitely has nothing to do with his strange, unspoken obsession with this monster’s rage.

“So you’re not gonna say anything, huh?!” Shizuo spits, grasping him by the front of his shirt and tugging him forward, “You’re just gonna sit there with that stupid fucking look on your face until I punch it in?!”

Izaya doesn’t know what to say, for the first time in his life. He’s dumbfounded, absolutely speechless, too caught up in watching Shizuo tear down everything around them to articulate a clever response.

“Well, I—”

“I don’t want to hear it!” Shizuo growls, and Izaya almost tells him that he’s contradicting himself, but Shizuo cuts that off too, “I wanted you to be Heiwajima Izaya, okay?! Or I could be Orihara Shizuo, it doesn’t matter! Don’t you get it, idiot?!”

He doesn’t get it, but the heat rushing to his cheeks suggests that maybe he should. Maybe if Shizu-chan weren’t standing here, so handsome despite the small fires starting around them and the dirt and blood smudged across his cheeks, Izaya could figure out what any of this means.

“Shizu-chan, I—”

“Shut up, okay?! Just—shut up! I don’t give a shit why you’re doing this. I don’t even know who the Hell that guy is over there and I don’t care about that either! I just want you to come home, okay?! Just… stop this bullshit and come home.”

Silence stretches between them, and maybe Izaya nods. Maybe Shizu-chan releases him gently, pulling away as regret plays across his face.

And finally, after so much time passes, after Koizumi slinks off into the night and Sawamatsu finally passes out, Izaya finds the will to speak.

“I hear that this time of year is really good for real estate,” he sighs, running a hand through his hair, “I do like my apartment, but it’s a bit far away from your job, isn’t it?”

The look that Shizuo sends him is borderline angelic. He tries not to focus on it too much, lest he become too swept away to carry on.

It’s not like Shizuo lets him anyway, pulling him forward into a rough kiss, but if he’d wanted to—

At least he could have focused long enough to come up with some witty retort about pet policies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew, a lot of things happened in this chapter! I really have no words to describe just how much got jammed into this single part. Well, I was very excited about writing this one! Finally getting Koizumi punched like he's deserved for so long, but... I felt a little bad for the poor guy. He really did not have a good night.
> 
> There are only a few chapters left now. Maybe... three? Four? Somewhere around that. This was supposed to be a fairly short sequel from the beginning, but now I'm a little sad that it has to end. Oh well, we'll cross that bridge when we get there! I hope you guys enjoyed this one!


	7. Resonant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One and two, me and you, dancing this endless dance around the world as though we're the only ones who really exist.

Shizuo flinches as the tweezers push their way into his skin. He doesn’t make a sound, but Izaya can tell by the pursing of his lips and the quiet intake of breath that he isn’t exactly pleased with any of this.

“We could always go to the hospital,” Izaya tells him, but he doesn’t stop, “But I know how adamant you are about keeping this between us.”

Shizuo nods stiffly, looking about the bathroom as nervousness settles in his eyes. He’d twitching impatiently, knuckles white against his knees as the tweezers find the bullet buried in his shoulder and dig it out. There are three pieces of it that Izaya pulls out of him, and after dousing the area in antiseptic and wiping away the mess with a rag that he isn't sure how they'll hide from housekeeping, he’s confident that there aren’t any pieces hiding away. 

“I’m not very good at first aid,” he admits, “I’m not keen on getting hurt all the time like Shizu-chan is.” 

Shizuo doesn’t seem too affected by this confession, however. He only nods again, letting out a slow breath and plucking the kit from Izaya’s hands. He carries himself toward the bathroom mirror with a gait that is entirely too graceful for someone who just got shot, but Izaya doesn’t mention it.

Nerves still rattle beneath his skin. The sight of all of this blood is bringing back unsavory memories.

“Cut that out,” Shizu-chan tells him, pulling stitches and gauze from the first aid kit, and Izaya wonders idly how many times he’s had to sew himself up if he’d purposefully remembered to bring so many supplies along, “I’m fine, see? It’s not like last time. And I was fine last time anyway.”

It’s Izaya’s turn to nod. The words won’t leave him—no scathing retorts, to snippy responses. His throat feels dry. His eyes itch, but no matter how many times he rubs them, the feeling won’t go away. He imagines that the smoke must have irritated them. Maybe he just needs sleep.

It has nothing to do with the memories of Shizuo bleeding out on Fukayama’s floor. It has absolutely no relation to how close Shizuo must have come to ending up in that position again tonight.

He watches as Shizuo expertly mends himself, winding the stitches through the corners of the wound and tying it together. His stomach does little flops as he takes in the blood, the tugging of jagged skin. Shizu-chan seems entirely unaffected by all of this, and he tries not to think too hard about how many times he’s done this exact same thing—how many of these ugly wounds that will eventually fade into unsightly scars might have been caused by himself.

He doesn’t feel guilt—not exactly. It’s a mourning, maybe, of all of those years that could have been spent getting to know each other instead of fighting to the death. All of those hours that he’d wasted planning this monster’s demise, when deep down, all that he’d ever dreamed of was reaching out and touching his marred skin.

“Heiwajima Izaya,” he says quietly, merely a whisper as Shizu-chan packs up the kit, “Wouldn’t it be a waste of such a beautiful surname if both you and your beloved brother threw it away?”

Shizuo doesn’t so much as twitch as he draws nearer, pressing his chest against a wide back, wrapping his arms around a thin waist.

He plants gentle kisses against the long scar aligned with Shizuo’s spine. And even then, Shizuo doesn’t move even a centimeter.

“Orihara isn’t too bad either though,” he says finally, “Wouldn’t your folks be pissed if you gave that up?”

Izaya’s laughter vibrates against Shizuo’s skin, fingers drawing faint lines against his chest as he closes his eyes. It feels too nice standing here, just taking in Shizu-chan’s warmth and listening to the slow beating of his heart. It’s a happy ending, he thinks, that maybe many would not think that he deserves. It’s a nice moment after a series of turmoil, a calm after a horrible storm, and maybe he doesn’t think that he deserves it either.

Maybe Shizu-chan is too good for anyone, but at the end of the day, he finds himself in the arms of the worst person. The person, above anyone else, who is not worthy of his touch.

What an oddly insecure thought, he tells himself. What an abnormal moment of self-evaluation.

“My parents aren’t as conventional as yours are,” he replies, “I don’t talk to them as much as you talk to yours either. Aren’t they going to be a little surprised when you tell them that you’re moving in with a man?”

Shizuo turns at that, not so much pulling himself out of Izaya’s grasp as simply twisting within it, bringing his hands to rest on each of Izaya’s cheeks.

“They don't care about it. I already told them about us last year. They seemed more surprised that I’d actually found someone.”

Izaya swallows hard. His ears burn, but he tries to ignore it. 

“You told your family about us,” he doesn’t want to believe it, and Shizuo seems to catch the surprise in his eyes in his reflection in the mirror. He laughs, low and quiet and almost not even there at all, before bringing his hands up to rest on top of Izaya’s own.

“Yeah, I did.”

No explanation, no anything. Shizuo presents shocking information in such a tongue-in-cheek manner, never stopping to contemplate whether or not Izaya might need a moment to compose himself after hearing such ridiculous things. As though he doesn’t seem to understand that he’s still full of surprises after so many years—as though he thinks that Izaya should have expected for him to out them to his beloved parents and cherished brother after so little time had passed.

He buries his face against Shizuo's chest, ignoring the heat that rises to his cheeks. It’s idiotic to become so frazzled because of something like this, but he blames stress. He blames the pressing matters that have become overbearing in the last few days—the wedding still looming over them. The Yakuza surely waiting to speak with him so that Shiki can flaunt his wit once they get home.

He doesn’t even want to think about it. 

Right now, Shizuo is taking slow, measured breaths, standing so still that he’s barely anything but a wall of heat and soft skin that Izaya clings to. He’s waiting for Izaya’s embarrassment to subside, drinking it in silently and trying to understand it. 

He’s supportive, even in moments like these. It’s as infuriating as it is confusing, as hard as it is to comprehend why he deserves such a luxury at all. 

He’s a bad man, a man who’s ruined many lives just for fun, but to Shizuo, it seems as though he’s someone worthy of this gentle, unyielding affection.

Shaking his head, he pulls away. He clears his throat and avoids Shizuo’s eyes.

“You should probably change out of those dirty clothes,” he says, a hitch in his breath that does not go unnoticed by either of them, “You smell awful. Take a shower.”

With a silent nod, Shizuo unbuttons his pants. He’s watched this scene play out before him many times—Shizuo undressing casually in the bathroom, be it during the mornings after he spends the night, or the evenings after one of their fights. He’s watched those firm muscles move about under milky skin, traced the decade-old scars as they’d cast tiny shadows under the fluorescent light. 

But for some reason, tonight, it hurts to watch him for so long. To take in the scrapes and burns against his skin. To be reminded of holding him that night in Fukayama’s estate, hoping despite all of the pain and suffering that he surely deserves that this one thing could just go right for him, for once.

He closes the door as he steps into the bedroom. He can’t bring himself to sit there quietly when Shizuo turns on the water.

 

* * *

 

Shizuo steps into the shower, letting out a soft sigh as the warmth of it envelops him. He watches the tiles beneath his feet pool with darkened water, a mixture of deep browns and dark reds swirling together as they make their way down the drain.

The new stitches against his shoulder feel no pain, but the tugging against his skin is annoying. He isn’t even sure which guy shot him or when it happened. The adrenaline skyrocketed and the blackness overtook his vision, and all that he can really recall is the satisfying feeling of Koizumi’s bones cracking under his knuckles and the relief that had flashed in Izaya’s eyes when he’d found him on the other side of the door.

It’s not over. Of course it isn’t, but maybe they can rest easy for now. Maybe Koizumi will finally leave them the Hell alone and Izaya can learn to ease back, to relax. To enjoy himself without worry, with the simple knowledge that Shizuo will always be there to help him. 

Even if he resists that with everything that he has.

With a grumble, he chases those thoughts away, grabbing blindly at the shampoo as the water pins his bangs into his eyes. He thinks about the warmth of Izaya’s body pressed against him, to the feeling of those fingers playing absentmindedly against his skin.

He thinks of Izaya’s eyes catching his in the mirror—darkened in the overbearing light, shadowed with the ghost of stress, of exhaustion, and the distant memories of a terrible night that he can't seem to be able to let go.

The sensation of subtle muscles moving against him, of a thin chest pressing itself against his back. His body reacts before he can even contemplate it—arousal swelling in his belly as he washes the last of the shampoo from his hair.

Calloused hands travel over his chest, wiping away the suds. Trailing downward over his navel, over the patch of hair below, leading all the way down to the erection poking out into the steamy air.

He thinks about Izaya on top of him—of Izaya straddling his hips on the other hotel's couch, wrapping that blindfold around his face. He thinks of Izaya pressing feather-light kisses against his lips. 

Fingers drag over the shaft of his penis, pressing lightly into the head. He touches himself only barely, biting back a hiss as his other hand comes to ball in a fist against the shower wall. 

He wonders if Izaya feels this way too. If he’s coming down from an adrenaline high, every emotion within him spiked with pleasure as he thinks about their bodies so close together. 

He shuts off the water, stepping out into the bathroom and toweling himself dry. He grins wryly at the erection between his legs, so stubborn, so relentlessly needy. It won’t go down no matter how much he tries to think of something else. No matter how much he ignores it, drying himself everywhere else first, it continues to stab out into the room, begging for attention.

Reminding him just how long it’s been since they’ve slept together for real.

Without the desperate handjobs, the sneaky oral sex—without the brief run-ins that he’s found himself slowly growing so accustomed to. 

But his body has grown hungry for more, he can feel it in the way that his cock twitches at the mere thought of Izaya waiting for him in the bedroom. 

He checks his stitches in the mirror, brushes wet hair from his eyes. He thinks about what the little headache must be doing in there right now.

Is he sleeping? Is he sending Koizumi a series of scathing texts? Is he…

Touching himself too?

He swallows hard, wrapping the towel around his waist.

Probably not, but the image of that alone sends heat rushing down south. There’s only one way to find out, he tells himself. He’ll open the door, he’ll ignore the aching hardness prodding through the towel. He’ll make sure that Izaya isn’t sleeping, and then—

He’ll strike.

 

* * *

 

Izaya stares up at the ceiling, twitching slightly as rain begins to patter against the windows and lightning brightens the sky. He’s not sure how he missed the ominous clouds hanging overhead this morning, how he could have ignored the way that the world was bathed in grayscale as he’d traveled around with Chiyo and slipped off to Koizumi’s building later on in the evening.

He contemplates the drop in temperature, finds himself wondering what the weather is like back home. Will their new apartment have a beautiful view, like the one from his favorite flat? Will he be able to overlook the city and take in the many dots of humans moving about, living their lives, unaware of the God watching them from far above?

He runs through these options in his head, unaware that the bathroom door is even opening until the light pools into the darkness of the room. He flicks his gaze over to the raindrops sliding down the glass, then slowly drags it to settle on Shizuo’s shadowed form. 

He’s a silhouette of blackness standing tall in the threshold. He’s silent, unmoving, and nervousness titters in Izaya’s chest when he can’t make out the expression on his face.

“Shizu-chan,” he breathes, too quiet for either of them to really hear it, but despite this, Shizuo moves forward.

His slow steps, the darkness that slams over them when he flips off the bathroom light. The lightning illuminating the room in bursts of roaring thunder. The air around them has morphed into something that he doesn’t want to recognize. Shizuo is closing in, bridging the gap between them with a knee on the edge of the bed and a hand that comes to rest next to his head.

“You were worried about me,” he whispers, climbing further up, straddling Izaya’s hips, “You did all of this because you thought that I’d get hurt again.”

Izaya’s throat feels like sandpaper when he swallows. The hardness poking out between them is not lost on him. Shizuo’s skin is warm and damp, buzzing with an electricity that pops each time that their clumsy limbs accidentally meet.

He can feel the warmth painting his cheeks. He can feel all of the spit drying in his mouth. Lightning strikes, and Shizuo’s pupils contract, diluting gradually as the darkness swims over them again.

Izaya can understand in this moment how man could have evolved from animal, how beast could have grown over so many years to become a creature that considers itself above all else—a race that feels worthy of a God watching over them. A people who feel that anything in life needs to have some sort of meaning beyond fighting and fucking, eating and rest.

Shizuo is a beast still, a monster traipsing around in human skin. His primal urges play out across his face, a rabid need to sink his teeth into the flesh of humans and mark them as his own. 

He tries not to laugh at the mental picture of it, because the Shizuo hovering over him is nothing but quiet, but gentle, but thankful and worried, and so many things that can only comprise a human. It’s taken him so many years to get here, to nudge himself forward into the realization that this man, who kisses him as though he might crack under the mere force of his lips, is not the variety of beast that children might find under their beds.

He’s a person, and only that. A human living with an unfortunate disorder. A man who cannot break free from the bindings of his birth, who loves, who loses, who fears and loathes just like everyone else who Izaya has ever encountered.

Just like his humans, but somehow—

So much better than anyone that he's ever met before. 

Shizuo has no consideration for his musings, however, deepening the kiss and sneaking his hands under Izaya’s dirty shirt. His jacket lays safely in its spot on the chair by the window. His shoes are tucked carefully by the door. 

Taking his time, Shizuo traces the lines of his abdomen, straying from his lips and kissing down his jaw, nipping at his neck. It’s a slow journey, a thousand gentle touches that burn against his skin. And he thinks that Shizuo marks him just fine, even without the teeth.

If God himself were to shine his heavenly light down and illuminate Izaya’s wicked, blackened soul, the monster’s fingerprints would surely be smeared all over it.

A click of his tongue at his own sappy poetics, but Shizuo doesn’t stop. He doesn’t even pause to question it. He pushes Izaya’s shirt up further, brushing careful fingers over hardening nipples. The cold of the room creeps over his skin like a blanket of discomfort, but he doesn’t move an inch.

He lets his eyes fall back to the ceiling, counting each of Shizuo’s slow heartbeats. He takes in the feeling of warm lips brushing against him, of experienced hands palming him through his pants.

Shizuo climbs lower down, kissing his exposed belly and meeting his gaze in the darkness. His heart flutters as he looks into those hooded eyes, mapping out the arousal there, the hunger, the hints of emotions that are far too intense for him to focus on for too long. 

He can hear his zipper rolling down, deafening in the quiet. His heartbeat feels like the pulsing base at a nightclub, rumbling through his veins as his pants are pulled below his ankles and tugged free from his feet. 

Shizuo pulls down his underwear, but leaves them resting just below his exposed, swiftly hardening cock. It pokes up between their faces, an obscene centerpiece that Shizuo just can’t seem to keep his eyes off of.

If this were last year, at the other hotel, during that month long job that felt as though it had lasted for a century, maybe one of them would have pulled away. Maybe the depth of this situation would have been far too deep, and in order to stay afloat, someone would have chickened out.

But not now. Shizuo reaches forward and grabs the base of his erection, not quite gripping, not quite ghosting his palm over it either. He works his hand all the way to the head, breath hot against Izaya’s skin as his eyes seem to fill completely with the black of his pupils.

A heartbeat, then two, and Shizuo opens his mouth and slides it inside.

The warmth and the wetness is overwhelming. He jerks forward, letting out a noise that he’s sure that he’ll regret later. It’s been awhile since Shizuo has touched him like this. The days have melted together, and he can’t seem to remember the last time that they slept together anymore. It feels as though decades might have flown by them, as though years have sped past and his body has forgotten the addictive feeling of this man’s hands touching him, branding him, everywhere.

His head falls back against the pillows, lids closing over his eyes as pleasure courses through him. Shizuo is grasping at his knees, not hard enough to hurt, but firm enough that Izaya can feel him resting there, holding him down to the bed and giving him no escape from this pleasure. 

Izaya can feel him bobbing upward and downward, dragging his tongue along the shaft and pulling back every so often to suck against the head. He knows all of the most sensitive places, how to touch Izaya in order to drag these humiliating noises from his lips, and tonight, he’s pulling out all of the stops.

Slowly, gently, he pulls himself away completely. Izaya murmurs weakly at the loss of sensation, cracking open a lazy eye to watch him pad over to their luggage and rifle through it for the lube.

“Sh… Shizu-chan needs to plan these th-things better,” he draws out, resting a hand above his head and taking in the view of Shizuo crouching down across the room, “You should have grabbed that before you starting attacking me.”

Shizuo huffs.

“Who’s attacking who now?” he asks, voice low with arousal, gruff and rumbly in a way that sends even more need pulsing along Izaya’s skin, “You sure don’t seem like a victim to me.”

Izaya can’t help but laugh, propping himself up on his elbows as Shizuo shuffles through their things. He curses quietly, leaning further in, and Izaya takes this opportunity to admire his backside.

“Shizu-chan is really pretty like this,” he says, before he can stop himself, and maybe he’s a little mortified, until he spots the dark redness settled against Shizuo’s cheeks.

He smiles at the accusatory glare, drops his head to the side to rest against his shoulder. 

“Maybe next time I should play the attacker?”

The question hangs between them. Shizuo doesn’t answer, even when he finally finds the bottle tucked away in a secluded pocket within the bag. He grumbles, making his way back to the bed and uncapping the bottle before climbing back over Izaya.

“You couldn’t attack me if you tried,” he says sardonically, bending forward to plant a kiss against Izaya’s cheek, “You’d chicken out.”

Before Izaya can retort, Shizuo presses oily fingers between his cheeks, dipping inside of him with little warning. It’s a dirty trick, he thinks, biting his lip hard to quell the noises that he can feel bubbling up in his throat. They find his prostate easily, stroking at it mercilessly as Shizuo plants more kisses against his jaw.

His cock jerks eagerly, precum beading at the tip as Shizuo rubs inside of him. It’s too much—the mouth moving down to suck against his neck, the fingers inside of him, the feeling of Shizuo’s naked body burning over his skin.    
  
He’s trapped beneath this heat, struggling feebly for relief. He can hear the squelching of lube between his legs, muted under the huffing of Shizuo’s pants, under the disgusting little noises that are sneaking through his own lips.

It’s not clear at first how it happens, or why it happens, but Shizuo rubs him a little bit firmer, biting down again his skin—and as though his body is determined to betray him in every awful way, the orgasm that he didn’t even realize he’d been toeing wracks through him. 

His vision grows fuzzy, skin tingling and muscles weakening. He throws his head to the side, refusing to look over at Shizuo and witness whatever stupid expression he’s wearing right now.

Never, in his entire existence, has he ever finished from this sort of thing alone. Not from fingers rubbing inside of him. Not before the fun has even started.

He’s mortified, more so than he’s ever been in his life. His breathing calms, but the heat never leaves his cheeks. He feels as though he’s drowning in the silence.

Until, finally, Shizuo speaks.

“D-did you—”

“Shut up.”

“F-from just—”

“Shizu-chan.”

“Y-you,” Shizuo pushes himself up, looking at the cum splattered between their bodies as though he doesn’t know how it got there, “You… you came just from me fingering you.”

Izaya clears his throat loudly, pulling away and sitting up. His underwear cling to him awkwardly, wrapped around the tops of his thighs in a way that makes it difficult to move.

“Shizu-chan was going too slow. This isn’t my fault.”

But when he finally looks at Shizuo’s face, there’s no laughter there, no jeering, no cockiness at all. If anything, he looks humbled— _impressed_ , even.

This is the worst moment of Izaya's entire life. 

Which is really saying something, he thinks. It tops being stabbed in the middle of a busy walkway, the black eye that he sported for over a month because of a nosy Russian with a great right-hook, and even watching this idiot barbarian foil his plans time and time again without even breaking a sweat. 

But of course, he tells himself, every awful moment must tie together with Heiwajima Shizuo somehow. And even now, he definitely doesn't disappoint.

“I… just from—”

“Yes, Shizu-chan, yes! Just from that! It’s not a big deal, it happens to people all the time—”

“It’s never happened to you before.”

He isn’t sure why he was so caught up in those thoughts earlier—about Shizuo being a gentle human, about his kindness, about how worthy he is of someone less awful.

Because right now, he isn’t deserving of anything but a solid punch in the face.

 

* * *

 

Late in the night, Izaya finds himself wide awake. He watches as Shizuo’s chest rises and falls beneath the blanket, bathed in moonlight from the open windows.

The clouds have parted, the rain cleared away to expose the stars twinkling far up in the endless expanse of black. It’s breathtaking: the windows of the building across the street lit up, glowing through the night and mingling with the stars. The gentle sounds of cars passing, the twittering of birds waking up. 

But he can only watch Shizuo. He pushes the hair from his face, lingering on the smooth skin of his cheeks as he thinks about the days that wind out ahead of them. 

The wedding, going home. Resuming life again after another bizarre adventure in this town. They’ll find an apartment, move in together. Izaya will begin to share the secrets of his work with Shizuo, he’ll begin to finally let him in.

It’s terrifying, to say the least. Invigorating, overwhelming. But in this moment, watching the other man sleeping, he feels nothing but contentment settling comfortably over his skin.

Maybe it’s best, albeit against his better judgement, to let Shizuo in.

Maybe, he thinks, drifting slowly into sleep, for once, everything will turn out for the best.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is so short! I'm so sorry. I'm actually supposed to be at work in about two hours, so please forgive me for posting such a dinky thing. A lot has been happening lately! The move, fall semester approaching... so many other things.
> 
> I know that I kept saying, "smut chapter!" but this ended a little anti-climatically. This isn't it, I promise. I might have added that part in about Izaya finishing from "just that" as a subtle form of bullying. I'm sure that my poor victim will appreciate it, if she notices. Oh well. Rest in peace, doki. 
> 
> Anyway, so sorry to be so brief this week! I'm going to try really, really hard to get you guys a longer one next week, but if anything, the shorter chapters just mean that there will be slightly more chapters in the future. 
> 
> See you guys next week!


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